Transcript: Committee of the Whole - 2026/09/10

September 10th meeting of Victoria City Council's Committee of the Whole, if I could have people please take their seats. Today we have for our consideration two items of land use to staff reports, one council member motion and one closed item. Could I have the attention of council please. Councillor Thompson is joining us online, so we do have a full complement today. Of course, before we begin our work together, we always like to take a moment to ground ourselves in our recognition and expression of appreciation and gratitude to the two nations on whose territories are city citizen its entirety. Ecosepsumnation and the Songhees Nation of the La Quangan people, we understand and take a moment always to express how pleased and thrilled and honoured we are to be able to do our work here in these territories. Which the nations have stewarded for so many, many generations with the intentive ensuring that we all who have the opportunity to live here have the best possible options

for how we make our decisions, how we raise our families. So we live our lives. And the decisions that we make, we hope here in this chamber, we hope to do respect that history as well as embracing and facing the challenges of today, as well as thinking about how those challenges and how we respond to those challenges create a future for those who come after us. Today we want to wish in particular the Song Heath Nation. Good luck as they have a by - election today to place a new council member into the vacant spot that they have that was caused by the death earlier this year of one of their elders. And so we look forward to embracing and welcoming whoever that new member of council might be and to work again with them individually and as a whole, both the Song Hisenkosapsum, and the very many opportunities that are ahead for all of us as we explore how to live the best lives

we can in these territories. With that, we always like to express our thanks to them in their language, which of course is to say hichrikasium or hydroghymnaquilia, which is to say thank you, and to also offer our respect and our gratitude to all of those people in our territories, in their territories, in our city, who take a moment each day to spend some time trying to improve the lives of at least one other person. I trick CM, Nicole. I have no remarks to add today, and I'm not aware of any late items that need to be added to the agenda, and so I would look for a member of council to move approval of the agenda. Thank you, Councillor Coleman, seconded by Councillor Kim. Any comments on the public agenda. Not seeing any, all those in favor. Anyone opposed. That is unanimous. That takes us on to the consent agenda, and I will just note for the public's information what has been proposed. Sorry, there

are four items, item G2, the 1114 Rockland Avenue Rezoning Application. The item H1, the Vancouver Island intercommunity business licensing bylaw. Item H2, the advisory panel by laws. And item I1, the council member motion, finding approaches for the City of Victoria to further respond to America's trade war with Canada. I'm aware that a request has been made already to remove item's G2 and H2 from the consent agenda. And so as is our custom, I will do so, and that remains then. Item H1 and item I1 as consent agenda items. Does anyone wish to add a remove anything else from the consent agenda. Not seeing anything else.

We removed or added, so can I have someone move the consent agenda, please? Thanks Councillor Kim, seconded by Councillor Coleman. All those in favor of the consent agenda being just those two items, anyone opposed. That is unanimous. Thank you very much for that. Interestingly, once in a while, council has scheduled item at a specific time to accommodate different issues or circumstances. These are called orders of the day for those who are familiar with the arcane world protocol. This morning we unusually do have such an item, and this item, in fact, requires some attention in a closed session. So first I'm going to ask Mr. Kingsley if you would remind counsel and the public. The sections of the Community Charter that either require or enable counsel to consider a matter in a closed session. Mr. Kingsley.

Thank you, Mayor. The reasons proposed to close the meeting today are under Section 91F of the Community Charter regarding law enforcement matter. In Section 92B, regarding the consideration of information received and held in confidence relating to negotiations between the municipality and another level of government. Thank you very much for that. So for those reasons, may I have a motion please to move into and convene at closed session. Thanks Councillor Coleman, second of my councillor Kim. Any discussion. Councillor Gardner. Thank you, Mayor. Excuse me. And I appreciate what Mr. Kingsley just read and about Section 90 and Section 92. The permit you to take this meeting into clothes and away again from public scrutiny. We've had a lot of discussion in the public realm now about closed meeting. Now Section 92 refers to all public bodies.

And so perhaps you can rationale as to why discussions with all public bodies, which one would expect to be public, is going to be enclosed. I think Mr. Kingsley reiterates the first of the Sections at our applicable to this would answer that question. That would be the law enforcement section. I'm sorry, Mayor. Can I just, the request is just to have it read again. Yes. Certainly. It's, the section is Section 91F of the Community Charter regarding a law enforcement matter. Yes, that's correct. Did you require the second as well? No, that's just, I believe that answers the question that was posed. Well, our question. Tory, my question really was that 92, which is the section that's underneath that one. Refers to all public bodies. In other words, we're having discussions with all public bodies. And I'm sure the General Public's wondering why discussions between and amongst all public bodies are enclosed, especially since we have so many closed meetings. I think the answer to that

would be the secondary aspect that's been presented by Mr. Kingsley would in fact be secondary in the first aspect that's been quoted would be sufficient for us to move in on this matter. Thank you. And since we have so many people present that look like they're here for the next one. Give any estimate of time so that they can go. Okay. Thank you everyone in the audience waiting. I know, I'll speak to that in a moment. Any other comments on the motion to move into a closed session. Yeah, I just had a hand up. Sorry, Constor Thompson, I didn't see him. Go ahead. Uh, thank you. Yeah, just for the members of the public that might be interested in this topic. I hope you all know that we have had literally hundreds of closed meetings over the last four years with unanimous votes to go into closed for discussions of matters like this and other matters. It is entirely a normal function of government. Thank

you. Thank you for expressing that opinion, Councillor Thompson. Anybody else. Okay, not seeing Anna or comments, all those in favor. Is anyone opposed. That is indeed unanimous. So just for the information of the public, this is an item that will require a little bit of time, although we're not certain about how much. So we will in fact return to council here in the chambers as soon as this matter is concluded, but in the meantime, I suggest it would be helpful for you to perhaps go and get yourself a cup of tea. So we will just take a moment to allow staff to move us into closed as there are certain mechanics that need to be required for that. And once that happens, we'll begin that session. And as I say, we will return as quickly as possible.

Thank you. Good morning. My name is Miko Batanzo, senior pine urban design with development services. I'm here with my colleagues, Crystal Steveno, our senior heritage planner, and are acting assistant director of development services, Jim Handy. This proposal is to rezone the property, to modify the site - specific regulations under the Oldtown District 1 zone to permit additional density for a purpose - built mid - rise residential rental building with ground four commercial uses and a publicly accessible plaza. A could - development permit with variances, addresses the proposed form and character, water and energy conservation and landscaping, and includes variances related to height, parking, and bicycle parking configuration. The key considerations are there for council, are therefore the proposed use density and massing as part of the OCP, and the development permit considerations relate to the form and character of the proposed building and the landscaping and the proposed variances insofar as their relative impacts and the measures proposed to mitigate those impacts. The site occupies

half a city block bounded by Courtney Gordon and Brownton Street, the scene in this aerial image. The existing site is currently a four - story parcade. It's a three - story structure, but a four - story parcade, and it uniquely has commercial uses at the ground level. This is sort of an aerial view, and then this is the view from Broad Street - looking South. Moving around the block, this is Gordon Street, where the ground floor commercial uses are concentrated. This is Courtney Street, looking north. And then when we move over to the neighbouring properties, we're still on Courtney Street here, where there's a mix of two to 7 - story buildings, and on the right hand of the image is the Magnolia Hotel. Moving around to Gordon Street, we can see that property is immediately across the street are at 1 - 3 stories with the overhyped wheeler building at the corner of Gordon and Brown. Kitty Corner to the subject site, we have

the 11 - Store Sovereign Building that was completed in 2013, and the 6th - Store Yarrow building. As you move east Downgrown, we get into the 3 - story Heritage Fabric Buildings that kind of define most of Oldtown. Then the building that shares the block and a property boundary with the proposal is the St. Andrew's Presbyterian Church, which is one of 11 landmark heritage buildings in the Downtown. Moving to our analysis. Of course, the Key City Policies that the application is reviewed against, include the official Community Plan, the Downtown Corps Area Design Guidelines, the Oldtown Design Guidelines, and the Rezoning and Development Policy. The subject property is located within the Downtown Corps in the OCP Urban Structure Concept. And at this location, a variety of land uses are supported, including residential and commercial as is proposed. Notably, the residential being proposed is Purpose - Bill Rental, which would be secured with a housing agreement. Additionally, the proposal exceeds the Zoning bylaw 2018 requirements for family

housing. Moving to the envisioned urban form, the OCP generally seeks to retain a low - rise - built scale that preserves and highlights adjacent heritage assets and tapers up from the harbour. Low rise is noted as building's generally in the four to six - story range. The OCP also, however, encourages a wider consideration to guide suitable - built form. And this includes the existing and future - built context impacts on public property and key views and alignment with zoning and other policy and regulations. Other key OCP policies include preserving and highlighting heritage assets, transitioning between areas with taller buildings, with lower - scale infill forms, and place - making that express the city values and promote distinctive features of Victoria. The proposed public plaza, which I'll speak to more later in the presentation, helps to advance these goals by highlighting St. Andrew's Church suitably transitioning to taller buildings, which is illustrated in the key view analysis, and by promoting distinctive features of the city with

its continuation of discrete pedestrian areas knitted into the city's urban fabric. Moving to the downtown core area plan, it's building height guidance reinforces the urban structure concept in the OCP at this location, and the envisioned building heights are up to five stories. Now looking at the proposal, it is for a 12 - story residential rental building with ground floor commercial uses and is proposed at a density of 5. 94 to 1 FSR. The existing zone density is 3. 9 to 1 FSR. Looking at the site plan, this slide shows the ground floor, which has the main lobby entrance off Gordon Street, and 3 commercial retail units, or CRUs. To activate the public plaza, a CRU is proposed adjacent with its exits and tables and chairs spilling out into the Plaza area. This is a landscape plan which demonstrates that you can see the table in which demonstrates this sort of effect, and you can see the tables and chairs in that image. This slide also

illustrates some of the extensive frontage improvements around the site, which include enhanced streetscapes on all three frontages. Rain gardens and landscaping that advance the linear Parkway goals for Courtney Street, a raised pedestrian crossing, extending beyond the centre line of Brownton Street to connect the plaza to the pedestrian areas on Broad Street. These improvements beyond bylaws, but beyond the bylaws standard would be secured in a legal agreement, an appropriate wording is provided in the recommended motion. This slide provides an additional view of the plaza, and some of the precedent images to illustrate the general intent of its design. There are three levels of underground parking, with the main entrance off of Courtney Street. In terms of the parking variance, 189 parking stalls are required, and 141 are being provided. This is a shortfall of 48 stalls.

To help mitigate the impact of this shortfall, a comprehensive transportation demand management, or TDM packages proposed. Key features of the TDM package include membership and BCTrand's ecoPaths program for all the units to evalue of just over 360, 000. Provision of an electric vehicle with an on - site dedicated stall, an increased long - term biking and bike facilities. All of which would be proposed to be secured in a legal agreement. This is the ground floor plan. The majority of the area at this level is devoted to CRUs, which is consistent with policy and helps to activate the street level. Moving up through the proposal, we're on the second floor. There are 26 apartments on this floor, including two, three - bedroom units. This is the plan for Floor's three to seven, which generally defines the podium for the proposal. And moving up to the eighth and ninth floor, the floors, the building transitions into its mid - rise form, and you can see the amenity

areas on the roofs of the lower portions of the building. This slide also demonstrates one of the benefits of the proposed massing distribution. The building's longest dimension runs north - south, which minimizes shadowing and creates preferential light access to the units. This aspect of the design is factored into the consideration of the height variance. And then as I flip through Floor's 10 and 10 to 12, you can see how the building's setbacks reduce the floor plate sizes as you move up in building height, which in turn diminishes the visibility to the upper stories when perceived at close range. These next slides show the building elevations, the image on the left is facing west on Gordon Street. This is the largest face of the building, and is evident in this image that the design approach to emulate a typical heritage building composition. There's a clear base middle and top, a formal gridded fenestration pattern, clear structural bays, and a higher wall to window ratio, which is

a hallmark of Heritage Buildings. These factors, along with a proposed materials, helped to make the application consistent with the forming character design guidelines. This composition continues on the east side and north elevations. And then looking at the Section Plan, uh, you can get a good indication of how those setbacks are proposed. This section plan running north - south shows the lower 7 - story sections of the building as it transitions to the lower - scale to a to a lower scale heading east towards St. Andrews Church. Here, you can also see the internal elevated outdoor amenity space in the middle between those two portions of the building. Uh, above the loading and parking entrances and portions of the CRUs below. This plan shows how that private amenity space is being planned out. Here on the left, there's a dog area seating trees and paving. And then the rooftop amenity spaces above the lower sections of the building are also illustrated with those relative landscape plans

as well. This slide shows that a green roof is also proposed, which forms part of the landscaping proposal. To illustrate how the proposed masking was distributed in response to the site context, this slide provides a step - by - step account. It starts with 1st achieving a separation to St. Andrews Church to reestablish its prominence within the street wall. And to be deferential to its heritage value. This pushed most of the density to a mid - rise building form that runs north - south emulating the existing larger footprint and orientation of the yarrow building to the north. Then, the building steps back and building articulation is added to diminish the visibility of the upper stories, align, building faces with adjacent building planes, and to break up the massing from key vantage points. These steps collectively distribute the density consistent with policy objectives for context sensitivity.

And again, these factors all contribute to the consideration to support that height variance. Looking at the shadow study, one of the concerns was that the building may shade the pedestrian areas on Broad Street, which is closed to vehicles. This analysis shows that this isn't the case, and instead the proposed plaza acts as an extension of this pedestrian area, which will receive ample sunlight midday in the summer and at the Equinoxes. Moving to the landmark Heritage Radius Policies, as previously mentioned, St. Andrews is one of 11 landmark heritage buildings in the Downtown. These heritage buildings are noted for their prominence as visual landmarks within the local streetscapes. Their ability to be commonly recognised and memorable, and for their overall contribution to the public realm. The related policies aim to ensure that the height setback sighting an overall massing of new buildings do not detract from or obscure the visual prominence of these buildings. Looking at the context elevation, you can see how the building massing is

set back and separated from the church by the plaza, and steps down towards it. In the lower image, you can see the existing site condition, which shows the parqued spiral exit ramp right next to the church. As the other images on the slight illustratory, the proposal significantly improves this relationship. Moving on to a render of what that will likely look like, I can flip back and forth to the previous slide to demonstrate this improvement to the Heritage Context. At this location, there's one public external view that is protected. So views looking at the city from afar, and that's the Laurel point view. The overall policy objective here is to conserve these views and the character - defining elements within them and to minimize impacts. The relevant guidelines include utilising sympathetic materials and colours and well - crafted detailing to relate to the adjacent historic buildings, using complementary massing proportion and spacings, and retaining the visual role of supporting buildings and reinforcing the General Patern of

Background Buildings. And so this is a view, the existing view. And I apologise because an existing view wasn't provided. So this is a Photoshop version, which accurately reflects the existing BULF form massing, but it is a bit blurry. Um, this is the image of the proposed building within this view, and so you can sort of get the difference between those two views. Um, to help council evaluate its impact. And so the analysis of the proposed height variants takes into account these factors. The view analysis, the building design, and its step backs, I'll just highlight it here as well. Uh, the existing built context and the provision of applauza, which largely contributed to the increased building height. Looking at all of those factors and the general impact to the Heritage Character of the area from the perceived height in conjunction with other aspects of the proposal, like its provision of purpose - built - rental housing, and significant frontage improvements, had led to the recommendation to

support the height variants. I'll now move through a series of illustrations that give an indication of how the building would be perceived from the public realm, which helps to evaluate its impact on the Heritage character of the area. So this is a view looking east on Brownton, and you can see the Sussex building in the background. This is the view looking north on Gordon Street, and in the background you can see the 11 - Storen building. This is likely the most impactful view. It's on government street - looking northeast. Uh, however, and I didn't provide this slide, but if you were to just turn your head to the southeast, the existing Belmont building creates a similar sort of height juxtaposition. This is the view from Gordon Street at Courtney. And then this is the view - looking South from Broad Street, where you can see the view terminus defined by this glazed green brick 7 - story wing of the proposal. And this last view

is of St. Andrew's Church from Douglas Street. This image shows the proposed material palette, and again as noted, the proposed materials and how they're employed are highly consistent with the design guideline goals and objectives for a contextual fit, which reinforces the Heritage character of the area. And I'll end on this rendering with the recommendation in the report, which is that the proposal is consistent with many of the design guideline objectives for building composition, materials, public realm improvements, and design. It's also consistent with several OCP objectives, including goals for increased rental housing and downtown living. The principal departure from City Policy relates to height. However, as noted, the proposed plaza, existing built context, view analysis, and relative consistency with other policies, suggests that this variant is supportable. Well, one heritage preservation objective to retain low - scale development is contradicted another to improve the conditions around Heritage Landmark buildings is advanced. Similarly, the proposed parking variance is supportable based on the comprehensive TDM package being offered.

And so far as parking, while the removal of the existing parking structure is a potential outcome of council's decision, council's key considerations are limited to the proposal's consistency with the relevant city policies. To this end, securing or adding secured rental housing, family - friendly homes, beyond requirements, and significant frontage improvements, further increases the proposal's consistency with the broader city policies. With this wider policy consideration, in addition to balancing the heritage policy, consistencies and inconsistencies, the recommendation is to support the proposal. That is it. Thank you very much, Mr. Patanzo. Let us start with questions. I'm sure there are many Councillor Hammond, why don't you start us off? Thanks, Merin. Thanks for the presentation. So what demonstrates the 12 stories is necessary to deliver the plaza and the other public benefits. Mr. Pretenso. So, through the mayor, what demonstrates that the 12 stories is necessary? I think if we were to look at the distribution of density, what we're looking at is some... I wouldn't say

that it's been demonstrated that it's necessary, but it's an outcome. It's the preferred outcome of the proposed density. So there are benefits to, um, to how that density has been distributed. Which gives us a benefit to the heritage context in terms of its relationship to the church. And although the amount of density that may be attributed to the parcel where the plaza is, may not be completely consistent with the amount of density that results in the 12 stories. It's sort of close. And so I think the review is that on balance, um, that additional height is justified on the basis of that improvement to the Heritage Context and the provision of applause - off Republic use. Thanks. And through the mayor, so that, but that means we have no evidence before us as a materially shorter building could also retain most of those benefits, is that correct? Shpetanzo. So through the mayor, I don't think our normal process isn't to request sort of a proforma

analysis on whether or not the amount of density is required. What we typically just analyse an application against is its relative consistency with policy under the premise that what is being proposed is what generally would pencil from an applicant's perspective. Okay, and you mentioned about heritage. And so staff told the Heritage Panel that the human scale is generally six to eight stories, and that twelve stories does not fully meet the objective. Why recommend 12 stories. Mr. Tenzo. So through the mayor, the recommendation to support the application at 12 stories is based on a more comprehensive review of City policies. Um, I apologise. I should typically say through the mayor. Um, so through the mayor, the consistency with the wider City policies is what staff are tasked with. And so in the instance of heritage review, um, it doesn't achieve all of the heritage objectives from that perspective, but from a wider sort of city policy evaluation on balance the staff recommendation is based on that,

which includes the provision of rental housing, uh, significant frontage improvements, and the plaza, as opposed to the one consideration of building height. Okay. And so then, again, getting back to the 12 stories when normally it's supposed to be six - day stories. Why not be recommending eight, nine, or 10 stories, for example. Mr. Patanzo. Through the mayor, the recommendation that staff have come to is based on that fuller analysis of the proposal. And so while we could recommend that the height be reduced, you know, we've had sort of a year - long conversation with an applicant on a requirement of a particular level of density to make the project actually work. And so we're working within that framework to sort of achieve the best outcome.

Okay. So through the mayor, if council approves this 38. 11 metres and 5. 94 to one FSR, where the framework contemplates 15 metres and 3 to 1, what's the limiting principle for future Oldwn applications. Mr. Patenzo. So through the mayor, so every application is sort of reviewed on its own merits, um, but I won't, uh, you know, every application that also get to prove, um, sets a bit of a trajectory for, uh, future development in the city as well. Um, I think some of the things to take into consideration are the incremental growth within Oldwn and within the city as a whole. And so our OCP speaks to how incremental growth is meant to be supported. And if we look through sort of an historical lend, we can look at, you know, buildings like the Magnolia are at nearly 5 FSR. Our most recent sort of hotel approved into Downtown is just shy of 5 FSR at 8 stories. And so there's an incremental growth

that the OCP is premised on supporting. And looking through that lens, um, that's sort of how we're evaluating each proposal as they come forward. So then through the mayor, can we expect, if this is approved that other applications will also come back double what is normally expected. I don't think I can speak to what you could expect, but there are tremendous development pressures on the City of Victoria at present. And I would expect those conditions to continue. There's also tremendous pressures on the City Victoria not to just turn into another city that is not like Victoria. So don't we also want to retain some of the things that are special about Oldwn and the specifications that we're expected. But for something like this application, uh, through the mayor, that is the condition and the consideration before council today. Okay, thank you. And one last question or in this area, Mayor, the parking study addresses the aggregate offstreet capacity. How a staff assessed the loss of

convenient short - term parking close to nearby businesses, especially for seniors, sorry, visitors and people with mobility limitations. Mr. Patenze. So through the merit, the assessment for the parking variance is based on the policies relative to what's being proposed. So, um, 200 and some odd units of residential housing is being proposed. There's a parking requirement to support that much development, the shortfall, uh, there is a shortfall of up to 48 stalls. And, um, that shortfall is being addressed to a TDM package. And so what isn't being assessed is the parking in terms of how it services the wider community, what's being assessed are the policies relevant to this application, which is whether or not that parking is suitable for the amount of density being proposed.

Sure. And through the mayor, I'm not suggesting that we can't turn public parking lots into other, other forms of business, such as housing, for example. But knowing that we got comments from some of the business around there that'll have a negative impact on them. Was there any analysis that was done about, um, how far people would have to park in order to use those business around there. And would that have an impact on them. Mr. Tenzo. So through the mayor, I can sort of parsley answer that, but I might look to our transportation colleagues to more fully answer that. Um, the, the analysis that the city undertakes from a staff perspective is relative to the policies that we have. And so the policies, you know, governing what we're looking at are the parking requirements for what's being proposed. Um, I think perhaps, you know, an analogous or an analogy could be, you know, one of the challenges with development in the city is the amount

of development that's happening. The volume of development. Well, there aren't policies in the city that govern or regulate that. Those are outcomes of city decisions rather than, um, an analysis of how much development should occur or shouldn't occur. Um, so, uh, no, that analysis has not been done from a planning perspective. Transportation may have other comments on that, uh, typically it's just relative to what's being proposed. Mr. Doyle, I see you leaning in there. Do you have something to offer? Through the mayor, assistant director Ross Kennedy is available to expand on Mehikhil's comments. Yes, I do see him online. Hello, Mr. Kenny. What would you like to add. Good morning, Mary Council. Um, through the mayor, I'd say so the applicant has provided a parking impact assessment that's in the attachments. Um, through their third party review, they've been looking at kind of the public demand of their own parking lot and surrounding area. Um, through that review, again, this is a snapshot in time.

They're, they're, they're demonstrating what they believe, um, and saying that there is a capacity in surrounding parquets. Um, however, you know, again, limitations always to, they're showing, um, peak demand, say at lunchtime midweek, um, that they're, you know, people would have to find alternatives. And again, this is looking from September. So, you know, different demand times in the report calls out, you know, say in the wintertime, there may be or in December or special events, You know, so, but we haven't specifically looked at, say, the parking impact as, uh, you know, Mr. Patazzo speaks to where we've been looking at the site and, uh, we would respond accordingly based on council's direction. Thanks. Mayor, I made a mistake. I actually have one more question. It's okay. Um, the Heritage Advisory panel unanimously recommended declining and a revision, what substantive changes were made afterwards. Mr. Patenza?

Uh, so through the mayor, no substantive changes were made after either the advisory design panel, uh, and the heritage advisory panel. I will sort of make comment that, um, that the sort of staff purview of that commentary. You know, reflects comments specific to certain aspects of the, of the proposal. So when we seek advice from the heritage advisory panel, we get heritage advice. Um, staff's role is more broad in assessing, um, the full suite of city policies. And so while their comments and inputs always inform our evaluation, uh, they're not determinants of what, uh, the staff recommendation would be. And therefore this unanimous decision of an expert panel did not form part of any of the decision of consideration of making changes to this proposal.

Mr. Tensel. So through the mayor, those, um, comments go to it, the applicant for their consideration. Um, in terms of staff's, um, use of that commentary, we always support, um, making amendment to applications following our advisory panel reviews and whether or not the applicant does or doesn't is at their discretion. Thanks, Mayor. Thank you. Good call, goodner. Thank you. Um, slide 18. To the mayor. I apologise. Which slide would that be? I can't see the number. 18. Oh, 18. Oh, the numbers are there. 201. 18. We received a note this morning in our mailboxes from someone, uh, on the, um, co - chair of the property finance and trustee of St. Andrews. And they state they're not going to take a position on the rezoning. However, they are speaking about their three car parking spot. Where is that on the schematic. So through the mayor, that would be, if you're looking at the sort of half circle, uh, of the church, it's that small grey area just in front of

that. That's what I thought. So what they have suggested is they proposed to, uh, that space, their space being incorporated into the plaza to make it bigger and better fit with the church if it goes forward. Uh, but they be guaranteed three parking spots in the new building. Has this been considered. Those discussions have occurred? They are ongoing. Um, and I can suggest that should counsel wish to formalize, uh, request that staff, uh, pursue those discussions further that an amendment to the motion could be made and, um, we do have some wording prepared. Should you wish to go that route? Thank you. We just got that this morning. Further to, uh, the combat that was just made about the Heritage's review panel. You will know on July 30th at a motion was arising on a different issue to create a heritage oldwn committee in order to not have oldwn go into a full broad consideration, but actually focus more on the heritage. And it was

to include a member of the Heritage Advisory Panel Victoria Civic Heritage Trust, the Hall of Mark Society. And no one other heritage experts in BC. Were any of them consulted. Are any representatives for those groups. Uh, through the mayor, no, our general process was followed, which just brings this to the Heritage Advisory panel. Thank you. The heights of nearby structures. What is the height again of the building directly to the West.

So through the mayor, I believe you're referring to the wheeler building at the corner. Yeah. So the Wheeler building is. Sorry, I apologise. It's a, it's a, yeah, it's a, it's a five story building and 23 metres. Thank you. What is the height of St. Andrews? I, you had a slide and I couldn't catch the number. I'm sorry. The height of St. Andrews to the main roof level, not including the tower. What would that height be in relation to the proposal? Would it be the 7th story, the 9th story? What would that height be. Strictanzo. So through the mayor, I don't believe we have that, uh, exact number, but I can probably provide a context image that might give us an indication there. So if we're looking at this context image, you can see that not the tower, but rather the main portion of the church looks to be about a story lower than the 7 - story wing. So about 6 stories which would

fall within the oldwn guidelines, actually, I think. Okay. Um, and what is the height just because there's so many comparisons. What was the height of the Kello Spilling. Tell us Ocean, Mr. Pretenza. Do you remember that off the top of your head? Through the marriage. I'll take me just a moment, but I can provide that.

To the mayor. Thank you. So it's 53 metres is the teles ocean building. 53 metres. And so I believe that was 11 stories, but it's a 10 to 11 stories. So this is larger than that. Um, sorry, through the mirror. It's actually lower than the telescope. No, but different stories is unusual. Okay. Um, but the lights, the structures are shown here. Six would be the same height. And seven. Got it. Okay. How does it propose development not meet the OCP guidelines or decapital scale guidelines. Mr. Patentzo. So through the mayor, the OCP speaks to the urban structure concept, which typically envisions buildings in that sort of four to six - story range. It's low - rise buildings within the harbour. Um, and then the downtown query plan reinforces those policies and sort of generally points to buildings at about the five - story range. And so, um, from that perspective, it would not meet those policies, um, in terms of the height of the building.

Okay. In oldwn is five, correct? To the mayor, that's correct. Thank you. I will mention though that the variability with that. It's not a hard number and it relates to, uh, a larger assessment of the site in its relationship to its surroundings. Okay. Frequently when I've looked at things in the past, that could be wrong. It's just me on memory. Uh, the proposal doesn't actually incorporate any existing heritage needs. Um, in other words, it's not contributing to, um, revitalization of a heritage building, et cetera. And is there not usually some kind of amenity in that way that comes forward when you have increased height. And density. Tensile through the mayor, I can speak to when we have, um, increase height in Oldwn that's associated with a heritage building or a heritage asset, typically the amenity is a seismic upgrade or improvements to the retention or rehabilitation of that heritage asset. There are no heritage assets on this site, but it does advance, um, heritage, uh,

form and character, wider neighbourhood considerations with how it is organised next to the St. Andrews Church. So that Plaza has a significant improvement to that significant heritage asset. Okay. I had a statement that I have problems with in the report. And I'll read it to you. It was in quotation marks. Rather than enshrining the proposed height within the new zone being created, it is proposed to be traded as a variance treated as a variance. This approach has a benefit of making the proposed height a condition only applicable to this application. Does anyone actually believe that. Because what I've seen over 20 years is no matter what you put there, it's a precedent. Yes. Thank you.

So through the mayor, the reason that the height would be treated as a variance is so that should in the future at this application, not advance. And if it were not treated as a variance, then that height would be permitted basically anywhere on the site. And so what could then end up happening is a building at this height directly adjacent to St. Andrew's Church, which would be a negative outcome that we're trying to avoid. So by having it as just a variance associated with this application, the BULT form is known. And the BULT form in what's being proposed is the most preferential to accommodate that height relative to St. Andrews. You're speaking in terms of a precedent, but the, the precedent being set would simply be through the construction of this rather than, um, whether or not it's enshrined. That height is enshrined in the zone. Okay. So this variance here only if they fail to build it, that it doesn't count. So, so there's

nothing being said that this isn't going to be present because I believe certainly will be. So that clarifies that. Okay. Um. So my parking questions was already answered. That's it for now. Consider Caradona and then Councillor Kim. All right. We'll flip it and we'll go to cancer camp. Thanks Councillor Kurt on it. Um, through the chair, regarding parking, um, and some of the concerns that the businesses in the area have raised. When, if, if this were to go through in the parquet is demolished. Do the public parquets and other parking lots in the city have the capacity to absorb. That loss. I think that might be a question for Mr. Kenny. Mr. Kenny, are you with us still. I guess could the question, please be repeated. Go ahead, Councillor him. Do you, uh, other parking lots and city parcades, um, have the capacity to absorb the loss of the, uh, four story parque. Um, through the mayor. So, um, the parking review that was completed,

um, found that within a two block radius of the, um, the, the site, um, that there was sufficient capacity for, uh, other parked vehicles to relocate to either City parquets or other private parcades, um, I believe at the report had suggested just at the peak hour, um, 15 vehicles may have to relocate outside of that two block radius. Would there be any, uh, changes, um, or would stuff have to examine, uh, on street. Parking spot rotation time intervals. Does that make sense in order to accommodate that peak. Um, so the, the, the report that was submitted to us by the third party, um, had shown, um, just under existing conditions, um, then through our regular operations, we're constantly looking at, um, say parking demand usage, uh, where we provide on street parking and make adjustments.

Um, so, um, if this project were approved, um, just given the scale of its own frontages and locations, we'd likely be looking at, um, parking demand on street after and making adjustments, um, but that would be similar to say other developments that would occur in the downtown. Thanks. And then last question is, uh, the, uh, Magnolia hotel had written with concerns about the loss of parking. Um, and I wonder, do you know if they or any other businesses have preexisting parking arrangements with the current parque there, um, that would be impacted. Mr. Kitty. Through the mayor, uh, more not aware of any, um, specific arrangements that are made, noting that we would anticipate, again, nearby businesses may use that parquet as it's available. Yeah. Okay.

Thank you very much. Thank you. Let us go back to Councillor Caradona. Thanks Mayor and through you. Thank you for the presentation. I wanted to ask some questions about St. Andrews and the proximity of all of that descent. Andrews, if we can bring up, I don't know, one of the slides that shows. Maybe one of the ones that shows the current arrangement. I first want to know how close is the current parquet? Like, yeah, that one on the left. It looks like two metres to me. Do we have a sense of how close to parquet is to St. Andrews right now. Through the mayor, your estimate is close. I believe it's about a metre and a half. A metre and a half. Okay. Um, I also want to just confirm, and I think it's come up. I really wanted to be crystal clear because the confusion about it in the community. Is this current. Parque privately owned? And does the City Victoria have any stake

in it? Mr. Patenzo? Through the mayor. Yes. This is a privately owned parquet. The city does not have an interest in the parquet or its management or administration. Okay. And so if this proposal were to be declined, would the proponents still have the right to demolish this building, assuming they met the rules and regulations of the city. Through the mayor, yes, currently permitted uses on site include residential up to a density of 3. 9 to one FSR, which would generally equate to about a seven - story building. And, um, that would be fully permissible under its current zoning. So just to clarify, we have no authority to prevent the demolition of this parquet. So through the mayor council's consideration is relative to the policies for what is being proposed and not, um, uh, whether or not a parquet should be demolished. And what is the closest city - owned parcades to this park aid. And how far are they. Mr. Patenza, or would that be

a Mr. Kenney question? Through the mayor, I can sort of provide a guess. Um, and I could take the measurements here, but the parquet at the library, the parqueade on, where's the other one? And on View Street as well, and those might be the closest parkades. I would think the library parquet on Broughton would be the closest. The library on Brown. Yeah, I, as I often do, I look at the, uh, the parquet app, not the City app, but the other one. And right now it shows brown street entrance. Has 35 percent availability. In browning street entrance has 40 percent availability Do we have any data on whether or not that's roughly normal and to be expected on. A weekday. In terms of demands in our perk aids. I rarely see them full. Centennials, the only one that regularly sometimes gets towards full. I see, Ms. Thompson leading in. Is that something you can answer?

Um, through the mayor. So what I can say is that the brown parquet is the one where we have the most capacity, meaning that it is the least full of all of them. Uh, it's rare that it fills up. Um, barring events happening at the Royal Theatre, for example, that's when it gets busier, uh, the busiest parcades are the Yaet Street Parquet and then also Centennial Square here. Thank you for that. So this is a bit of an awkward question to ask through the mayor, but what the city stand to gain materially if there was fewer private parcades that we're competing with. Uh, not sure that that is an appropriate question for any of our staff to lean into. Well, let me phrase it differently because that's maybe a bit crudely stated. But what we expect there to be more business in terms of vehicles going into city - owned parcades if this parquet were to disappear. The more politely praised, the question is the

same, and I'm not sure that that would be appropriate for staff to conjecture. I think it's legitimate to ask if this would be expected to increase usage of city - owned parquets. That seems like a legitimate question given that we're potentially losing a very large private park aid. Mr. Pachano, is it a material consideration when considering a land the use application to analyse the Financial Benefit to the City in alternatives. So through the mayor, I would suggest that it isn't. Staff typically would speak to the relevant policies that we assess to determine the supportability of an application or not, and whether there's any material gains to other city assets. It's not part of our analysis.

Okay, I'll accept that, but what I'm getting at here is that there has been consternation about the loss of a parquet, which seems reasonable. And so what I'm trying to do is understand how the totality of this decision would impact transportation downtown. And so what I'm attempting to establish here is that there are several city - owned parcades within blocks of this one. They seem to have capacity on an average Thursday afternoon. Um, and so I'm trying to understand globally what the impacts would be here. So if you want to give any high - level comments on that, then I do think our material. Mr.

Patenzu? Yeah, it's through the mayor. What I would suggest is that the impacts of council's decision may impact the availability of privately owned parking in the city. The analysis in terms of parking relative to this application are based solely on the provision of parking for what is being proposed. And so while those impacts are, uh, an outcome of a decision, they are not material to the decision before council today. Okay. In terms of the plaza itself, can we have a look at one of the renderings of the plaza. Maybe from the streetscape. Yeah, that I think that'll do. So a couple of questions about that. First, and there was some shadow studies that went by kind of quickly, but it seems like this would have a relatively good South facing exposure. And so I just want to get a sense of how well - lit this plaza would be during the day.

Yes. Through the mayor, thank you for the question. So typically where we would be locating plazas is on the South aspect of a proposal or of a parcel. In distance, the main function of this plaza is beyond providing public space is to improve that relationship to the St. Andrews Church adjacent. In terms of light access, um, the shadow analysis showed that at Summer Solstice and, uh, at the Equinox is that there is ample light access during midday. Um, this area of the city, uh, you know, it does have buildings and it does C shade later in the day. But, um, currently there is only a, a one and a half story building to the South, which provides lots of light access to the plaza. Thanks.

And through the mayor, what are the SEPT principals that have been applied here to this, to this plaza that are maybe, maybe are relevant in material to our decision? Yes. Through the mayor. So, um, with all public spaces, the typically a concern around septair issues, uh, in order to address that, the applicant has proposed a commercial retail unit fronting onto the plaza. Um, uh, it has been noted that, you know, parkades also after, offer, uh, step 10 issues, um, the management of that parquet has been, you know, sufficient to, um, mitigate some of those concerns. In this instance, that sort of, um, passive surveillance of the plaza, the activation of its edge, uh, and sort of how it relates to both the BUL form of what's being proposed. The street in general and the pedestrian areas of broad street, all sort of address those septead concerns. Okay. And, and just drilling down on that a bit, the written by urbanists about what the difference is

between successful and unsuccessful plazas. And I know that staff have thought a lot about this too. And, and in this city, we have examples of both. And one that's often brought up as an unsuccessful plaza is that sunk in one on Blanchard and Pandora, then no one ever seems to patronize. I won't get into centennial square. And then other plazas are quite successful. So what, to your minds is the difference between a successful plaza, which I would define as safe and activated. And versus an unsuccessful plaza. And what features do you see here that suggest it would be successful? Mr. Downsell? Sure. Thank you. Through the mayor, uh, I think some of the considerations that you've brought up are, are very relevant. And, um, typically what we look for in terms of what makes successful versus not successful public spaces is what occurs along their edges. And so in this instance, one of the edges here is significantly activated. It also has the benefit of

overlook from the, um, uh, private outdoor spaces on the building adjacent. And so from the 7 story portion of the building and that entire middle section of the building, which is the private, um, outdoor amenity space for the residents. So that's all a passive surveillance sort of, uh, approach, um, to making the plaza successful. Other attributes include seating, shade, um, activation from, uh, adjacent CRUs being at grade is an important attribute as well. And similarly linking this plaza to other successful pedestrianized areas, uh, provides an opportunity for it to be successful as well. And as we know, broad street has been closed to vehicle traffic.

And it's a rather active public area. And, um, you know, making this more of a contiguous area of pedestrian activity, uh, all contributes to its success. Thanks very much. Last question for me, it looks like 37 percent of the units would be family sized, which I believe exceeds our family housing regulation. Uh, and there's 242 rentals. So conservatively, if this building were fully tenanted up, what is the approximate number of people that would be living in this building? Mr. Pacha. Through the mayor. I mean, we'd be looking at about, um, potentially 500 odd people. Thanks to them for the questions. Councillor Thompson. Thank you Mayor.

And through you, thanks very much to staff. Um, this is an important decision coming to us and, uh, appreciate you presenting the pros and cons of it for Oldwn and for local businesses and residents. Appreciate the thoughtful analysis and report on the fact that it, as Steph mentioned, it took a year to get, uh, to us already, uh, with the work being done. Had a couple of questions about height and about parking. So on the height, um, uh, just as background, sometimes in communications aimed to the public, not, not by city staff, not city communications, but, but other, other folks writing in social media and the letters to the editor. They seem to imply that the numbers in plans and policies are more like the numbers in a regulation. I'm just wondering if staff can explain for the public, uh, the different effects of numbers.

On one hand plans and policies. And on the other regulations. Mr. Patanzo. So through the mayor, thank you for that question. I think that is an important distinction. Um, typically plans and policies insofar as the OCP and the design guidelines speak to General figures. And so there's a, you know, a general intent that the heights within Oldwn are remain at around five stories or 15 metres. And that's generally what staff are working to assess applications. But that doesn't mean that buildings that are slightly higher than that or slightly lower would be automatically, uh, recommended for decline. There is a full suite of policies that, uh, form part of the analysis, um, and that's the key differentiating factor between policy and regulations. Regulations on the other hand reside within the zones. And those are hard and fast numbers that if there are discrepancies with those, they result in, uh, variances that need to be dealt with and assess that way. But in terms of, um, what

specify within the OCP and design guidelines, we're speaking to Generalities. And the plus and minus in all of that in terms of staff's assessment. Yeah. Thank you. Some pros and cons, I guess. There's, um, if anyone in the public is interested, then litigation on this recently in Victoria, uh, where I think that the lawyer for the lawyer, uh, one of the lawyers was confused. The court was not confused about the difference between these numbers. Um, on parking. So I know that city staff are aware of the need for nearby businesses to have parking for, for both workers and customers. But I'm wondering if we can talk a little bit about the, uh, parquet that's on the site right now. I appreciate that you've already addressed some aspects of it. Um, there was some discussion about, you know, can the person, can the owner demolish it?

And I guess that would require a permit. But can short of demolishing it, um, can the City even force an owner to keep the parquet operating? Or can they just say we're closed. Through the mayor, this is a private business. It would operate under the conditions of a private business and they can decide and elect to close or open as they so choose. Okay. Thanks. Um, there's been some, uh, questions about nearby city owned parking. I'm just wondering if perhaps engineering staff can talk about the direction that council gave some time ago to explore options for parquets more on the sort of edge of downtown.

And if that's sort of still in the works and where that's at. Thank you, Mr. Doyle. You may recall some time ago that council provided direction to explore parquet on the north end of the downtown. Can you speak any to any information on that? It's more current. Through the mayor, uh, first step would be a financial feasibility study. Needs to be a sort of considered for future. It's not something that we have immediately taken on in our, in our workload, uh, but, uh, considering it amongst all COR broader CURBUSA throughout, throughout Downtown. Thank you for that. Councillor, did you hear that? I did. Thank you very much. Um, yeah, apart from City Parkades, if you, if, uh, if any of the members of the public, you know, just go into Google Maps and search for parking, you'll see a lot of things in that area.

But, um, about, I think the base enter is one short block away. How does, do we have any idea how many metres away the base centre parking lot is arcade, I should say. It's privately owned. Yes. Our stuff are actually doing mad calculations, but you're at councillor that entrance is off of Vue Street. So it would seem to be from an access perspective a bit further, but you're right, it is only a block away as the crow flies. But to accessing, it would be, I guess, the equivalent of two blocks. There's still calculating. That's, I guess, mirror, that would be two blocks of driving, but one block of walking. Cause I think you can get out the, uh, the west side of the, um, base centre. Well, while, while Stafford looking at that, and I don't need a precise number, uh, something approximate would be great. Um, I note that there's also two Robbins parkades, um, to the east and the west by about a

block. So if, if first Stafford just drawing a radius circle, maybe they can advise on those two parcades as well on roughly how far they are. With. Mr. Patazzo has an approximation now for the, what's called the bay parcade. I'm not sure if the others are there. Go ahead, Mr. Tenzo. So to the Marriott, the Bay Parquet would be about 300, approximately 300 metres away from this subject property. That would be the entrance to the vehicle entrance. That's correct. Yes. Go ahead. Okay. And then the, the walking entrance to the bay street plaza or the base treat mall. Or the bay mall. Yeah, that would be a block shorter because you can walk into it from the fourth street side. Okay. Um, and then the, the others that I mentioned, the Robbins Parquet that's about a block to the west and the Robins Parquet that's about a block to the east. Yes. Stafford checking. I believe they're mapping the local mouse. Oh, that's a. Smart

way to do them. Yep. They're mapping the local parquets.

So through the mayor, the Robins Parquet is about 130 metres away. 130 metres. Thank you. Councillor. Okay. Is that the one that's to the east or the one that's to the west? Sorry. Through the mayor, that's the one to the east. Okay. Um, okay. I don't need to know the distance. So the other one. It's about the same if you look on, on the map. Um, the one to the west, um, down by Langley Street. I know that the city provides about 70, 000 on street parking spaces. Those are obviously not all downtown. Do we know the numbers of on street parking spaces that are downtown. I don't think that's a Mr. Ratanzo question. Actually, interestingly, Ms. Thompson is checking. That's because parking technically comes under the finance department. Yep. She's madly typing.

Councillor, do you have another question that you could ask? Well, unfortunately that is my last one. And we could move on to someone else and I can get that answer later. That's fine. Okay. We'll do that as we did, uh, earlier with some other items. Uh, so if you included then, I will go on then to Councillor Lohn. Thank you. And through you mayor. Um, I'm just curious about the state of the decap plans and the heritage review for Oldwn. Cause that is in Flux right now. Are we imagining that things would change to this kind of height and density. Justin, I think this might be for you. Through the mayor. We're still in the early stages of scoping out that work. Um, so it'd be premature at this stage to speculate on what the outcomes might be because that will be a lengthy process involving a lot of engagement and research and analysis. And we'll be bringing forward even a report scoping out the

approach for council's consideration later this year. Okay. Thank you for that. Um, would someone be able to through you mayor, I'm just curious about where we are at in our housing targets for, for rentals, purpose - built rentals. And if someone needs a second to look that up, I can move on to my next questions. Who would be able to? Are we exceeding or are we falling behind. In our rental targets? Do we know that how we're faring in the overall? I know that we've been exceeding them in the first couple of years. But how are we on track to continue that trend or have we leveled off. Mr. Johnson. Uh, through the mayor, we may take a minute just to check in with my staff in the housing, um, division to get an update on that, um, overall the city has been exceeding their housing targets. Um, in recent, uh, with a recent reporting, we have been exceeding our housing targets. Okay. Cancer. Um,

yeah, thanks for that. It's just specifically for rentals because I'm just also curious if there was any conversation with the proponent about doing a hotel on this site? Or was it only focused on purpose - built rentals. Mr. Townsell? Yes, through the mayor. I do believe those conversations were had. You know, it's always difficult conversation to suggest something completely opposite to what's being proposed. Um, this applicant does have a portfolio of what they typically propose and purpose - built rental is their portfolio as opposed to hotel. But, uh, with all applications, we seek to achieve the broader city goals and always have those conversations. Okay.

Thank you for that. Um, there was just a question that came from, like some of the businesses in that area, as has been mentioned, are concerned about parking and also, um, Jeff Bray from the DVBA brought up the ability to successfully fill all the government, the empty government spaces. So he was suggesting there's 150 to 200, 000 empty square feet. I would just like some confirmation on that vacant office space, what our plans for that are and whether losing 300 parking spots at this park head would affect our ability to plan on how we're going to fill that vacant office space, government space. For Johnstown, I'm not sure that that's something that we've turned our minds to, but if you have any preliminary comments, you're welcome to offer them. Through the mayor. Um, yeah, no, at this stage, I think, uh, I wouldn't have anything to offer in terms of how we anticipate dealing with that situation. But, um, yeah, it's definitely something that we

are aware of and monitoring and turning our minds too. Okay. Um. And another, um, one of my colleagues asked about this, but the new parquet that was to serve downtown, we're waiting on the financial feasibility study. So how do we. I know this is difficult to answer, but are we, you know, years away from that materializing or is there a way to say, you know, we're losing this parquet, but then that parquet is coming and we can somehow align that. Is that a possibility? Mr. Doyle, do you have any comments on that in a preliminary fashion? Through the mayor, would suggest it's on the magnitude of years. Rather on the magnitude of years rather than months. Just want to share some further data that's been identified through my colleagues. So this Downtown Victoria has more than 7, 300 total parking spots. So this is broken down about 1900 on street spaces. Uh, 1900 spaces across the City of Victoria Parque's. Uh, parking spots across private

parking lots and parkades. So while the loss of this, this private parquet is a good number in the ground scheme of the sites acrosswn. Don't see an immediate unmanageable impact. Okay. Thank you for that. Okay. I think that's it for me for now. Thanks, Mayor. Councillor Dell. The first time. Thank you so much through the mayor. Can you confirm this building is consistent with the OCP. What's your penitencil? So through the mayor on balance, that has been the, uh, conclusion staff has reached. Okay. Thank you. Um, through the mayor, my understanding is just quite drastically exceeds our family housing policy more than I've ever seen in our term of council. So can you just mention the family housing policy? Would you say it exceeds this drastically exceeds this? How was that part of the discussions of a priority? I see there's 24 three bedroom units, which I've never seen in a rental project really. How is that discussion with the applicant. Mr. Conselho. So through

the mayor, the applicant offered, um, uh, to exceed the family housing policy. It wasn't so much part of a negotiation or a, or a, uh, I think it's part more in part and parcel of the, um, part of their portfolio of what they like to put onto the market. Um, it does exceed the family housing policy. I'm not sure if I'd say it drastically exceeds, but it is in excess of what's required under the family housing housing policy. Okay. Thanks. Uh, my takeaway from the report through the mayor was that this building in some ways could be read as supporting heritage, particularly with, um, building this plaza around one of our 11 designated heritage building.

So we're kind of weighing that it's a little bit tall, but it also opens up this space. So a building I've actually never been in. I really, I think you can't really enjoy this building like some of the other ones because of how constrained it is. So is it fair to say in some aspects of this proposal support, Oldwn in the City's heritage. Mr. McDonnell. Through the mayor, within the report, we speak to, uh, a number of aspects that help to support the heritage character of Oldwn. Some of those aspects include just the design and composition of the building in terms of its built form, its fenestration, structural bays. The materials, those aspects of the proposal are consistent with what we would want to see in terms of supporting heritage character. And then to your point, um, it advances the landmark heritage building policies by creating a better interface between St. Andrews Church and the public realm versus what is there now. So some aspects

of the heritage character, uh, of this area are improved while others like the retention of a lower scale built form are contradicted. Um, this, the housing part of this is pretty straightforward and impressive. I guess my thought I want to switch over to the parking and traffic. Are there opportunities? You know, this is a very dense area with businesses around it. One of the things that we've seen in our time as of every single council is a construction process creates challenges. You know, you're blocking off roads. Are there opportunities to improve the construction process for nearby businesses in terms of like, you know, limiting the amount of space that's being taken up. Like for example, in the telesocia building, it's been a lane for a couple of years causing chaos. Has that been a discussion with the applicant of ways to perhaps build a building like this without, you know, completely blocking off half of Gordon Street or, or, or really. Negatively impacting those businesses?

Or is it just pretty much a standard process that you just have to suck it up for X amount of years? Mr. Pretenso? So through the mayor, I, um, this isn't part of, um, the land use application review, but I am aware that there are, um, movements within the City to try to make that less impactful. I don't know if transportation or engineering could speak further to that, um, you know, typically once it's under construction and its impact on the public road infrastructure, uh, falls under the transportation and engineering remit. Mr. Doyle, do you have anything that you'd like to add. Through the mayor, Mr.

Kenney's available to expand. Mr. Kenney, if you're still with us, I wonder if you heard that question just about, uh, anything that the city is currently contemplating or doing to mitigate the impact of construction. Um, sure. Um, so through the mirror, construction of, um, all aspects, you know, whether that's private development, um, CDS, it's a third party utilities, uh, we've reviewed those construction plans and issue street occupancy permits. Um, for private development, uh, whether it's this or other buildings, um, people pay for the usage of city street for that construction. So one of the, one of the tools that we have is by, um, by pricing the use of, um, road space parking side block space is encouraging people to keep sites, uh, their construction, um, impacts as little as possible on a site such as this with a public plaza, uh, because that's owned by them. We'd be encouraging as much of that construction activity actually from say that plaza space ourselves. Um, to

limit that impact on the street surrounding it. Um, while we also modernize, continue to look at our processes. You know, we are also contemplating in the future how we might be able to come up with policies around, um, around how our hoarding is, you know, so the fencing around sights, um, what that looks like. We work with businesses to provide ensuring, you know, as much as possible, keeping good aesthetics, uh, where road closures or sidewalk closures are required, you know, staying on top of them with things like graffiti removal. But overall, you know, our street occupancy program, which, um, brings the net revenue to the city, but also helps to manage that public impact as our main tool at this point to minimize, uh, public disturbance. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Kenney. I guess two more questions perhaps for you. Number one on the parking, so you just mentioned that the applicant would pay the city for use of the road space. Have

we ever considered in a project like this actually, um, giving, you know, parking credits on the park Victoria app to nearby businesses to say, Hey, you know what? You get XML per day. You can give to your customers given the, uh, the impacts on street parking. Or are there any of those kind of conversations? Is number, question number one. And number two, would staff consider looking at the flow of traffic, like such as perhaps reopening broad street, uh, just to make sure the bit more either availability of street parking or availability for cars who are kind of stuck in this construction zone on pretty tight streets. I don't know if that means would mean government street or broad is the one that comes to mind.

Are those options on the table, uh, or that, is that needed council direction. I think the first part of that question is probably, um, as Thompson, then the second part of that question is Mr. Kenney. So let's go in that order, Thompson. Through the mayor. So yes, businesses have been contacted us about the possibility for them to basically purchase time for their, um, patrons. So law firms and those types of things. For example. So we're exploring how we can accommodate that. Um, so they would give out essentially how that would work would be similarly to how we did it at Christmas time when we offered the joy code, um, and that gave a credit on the person using the parking at that time. So, uh, we haven't implemented that yet, but it's certainly part of our ongoing conversations about what some businesses may be interested in participating in. Thank you for that. Mr. Kenney, your comments on traffic rerouting. Um, chat through the mayor. So,

you know, with when we have major disturbances or construction, um, definitely things that we look at is what that public impact is for, um, pedestrians, people driving, uh, people cycling in transit. And we do make modifications in certain locations. Um, sometimes that's, um, making changes to our traffic signals, banding turns, um, allowing vehicle turns where they're currently prohibited. Um, in this case, I think we would need to see the specific construction plans of what the impacts are and how the loading is. And then, uh, we could investigate whether or not, um, say opening of streets would be required. Um, just given the scale of these, I think these would be ones that we may, you know, depending on bringing to council's attention, depending on the duration. So things like government street, if it was needed for a few days, uh, to facilitate specific activity. That might be something we just look at moving forward as engineering department versus say a few years. Um, but overall,

um, we are constantly looking at ways to keep vehicle and pedestrian and cyclist circulation open and something we would take into consideration. But this project. Thank you. Okay. Just maybe as a quick follow up. So in terms of broad street specifically, which is pretty much right across the street from this plaza. Is that something that would need council direction? I don't know if it's a good idea or not, but I just know there are, there is street parking spaces available there that the local pistols do use for that kind of quick turnover. Is that something council direction is needed to explore? Or is that something staff have authority to explore and consider on their own.

Mr. Kenny. Uh, through the mayor, I believe currently staff do have the authority to say reopen that's to reopen a street such as that. Um, though, with council having the ultimate authority to say, you know, provide direction or council motion, um, either to support or, you know, disagree with the staff's recommendation. Um, Broad Street, um, you know, if this were happening, it's one that we, we could look at noting the other complexities with broad street with the sidewalk and patios and other uses. Um, but something we'd be looking at. If there were impacts, um, say I'm broken that required extensive closures or other changes. Okay.

That's it for me. Thank you. Uh, Councillor Kim and Councillor Gardner have both asked to ask a second question, but I'll go to Councillor Coleman first. Is the first time speaking? Thank you. And through your worship. Let's just get our nomenclature right. St. Andrews Cathedral is three blocks away on Blanchard Street. This is, uh, and it's been referenced to number of times. This is St Andrew's Church. They share the diagonal cross of, uh, St. Andrew, uh, the soldier, but they have very different perspectives. And one has a bishop. The cathedral. This one doesn't. So we're talking about the impacts from the heritage perspective on St.

Andrew's Church. The question I have is, if we had, um, an application come forward with the same floor space ratio of 5. 94 to one, but didn't have that plaza. And the setback was the same as the parcade. What would the height be lowered to. Mr. Patenzo. So through the mayor, I can provide an estimation of what that would be. But I think you'd be in the realm of about eight stories. Okay. Thank you. So then as it crystallizes in our mind, is this really about creating the breathing space for that heritage building that's there, St. Andrews Church. And in order to do that, we're adding height on the rest of the site. Mr. Bertanzo.

So through the math, there'd be a number of considerations for how the overall density has been arrived at. One of them is, um, the ability to improve that relationship to St. Andrew's Church. But another one is obviously going to be, um, uh, whether or not the project is financially feasible. Um, and with most development projects, the financial feasibility is the primary consideration. Okay. Thank you. And earlier you referenced the fact that there are ongoing discussions between the applicant and the presbytery or the guiding mind of St. Andrew's Church with respect to those three parking stalls, do you know where that sits. That discussion is. So through the mayor, the discussion has sort of been ongoing.

It would benefit from some direction from counsel to more formally coordinate that discussion. Um, uh, staff can provide some wording. Should council wish to go that route. But at present, there is no resolution. There are many details that would need to be worked out such as access. And if there's any costs involved or anything like that. But, um, they're pretty preliminary at this stage, I would suggest at those discussions are at. Thank you for that. It was referenced earlier that we did get a letter yesterday from the Presbytery. They did offer some wording. So maybe I can share that with you later and see if that can be incorporated in this. Thank you. Thank you very much. Uh, we are getting very close to our lunch break. So I'm going to go first to Councillor Kim and then to Council Garder to see if we can wrap up the questions. Nothing else Councillor Gardner? Quick question about the plaza. We spoke of the sun. And

so what is the building the one and a half story directly to the south and who owns it. And the chance it might go up to five or 10 stories. Going forward. Mr. Patenzo. So through the mayor, the St. Andrews Church actually owns that building. Okay. I believe it might be operating as a daycare at present. Um, but I'm not a hundred percent certain as that with that. It's its own four for height right now. And so is it's possible. So currently it is zoned to, to go up to 15 metres and three FSR. So that's generally around that five story limit. So it could go five stories which would probably get rid of a lot of the sunlight in the plaza. If the church exercises that zoning opportunity. So through the mayor, that hasn't been analysed. But, um, there is still, uh, sunlight available, uh, I would believe at the summer solstice, uh, for light access in the plaza, but it would significantly diminish

the access to. Thank you. I'd only go in June. Okay. Thank you. Thank you very much. Not seeing any other questions, but it is in fact now noon. And so rather than a proceeding with the motions, I'm going to suggest that we take a break now when we return, I will look for someone to move the staff recommendation or I believe there is an alternate, but we'll go to council for their preference. And then I suspect there may be some, uh, potential amendments as well. So I suggest that we would want to consider that all at the same time. So folks, let us return at 1 p. m. and we'll resume with a motion to council on this matter.

For the multiple addresses at 617 through 635 Brotons, 620 through 630 Courtney and 909 through 919, that's hard to say. The Gordon Street. We had, I think, exhausted most of the questions, although I'm aware the couple more. And before I go to questions from council, I'm actually going to go to Mr. Johnstown, who wants to relate some information that he had discovered in response to a question that was asked earlier. Mr. Johnson, over to you. Thank you and through you mayor. Just wanted to circle back to the question about rental housing targets that was asked earlier. So I was able to get some more detailed information from our housing team. So we have a target, an overall five - year target established by the province for 4, 902 units to be completed by 2028. The breakdown of Rental within that target is a city guideline in our target is 3, 483 during that five - year period. And so in terms of where we are

at to date, we have total rental completions. They're sitting at 2, 224 rental homes. So those are constructed and have received occupancy. In terms of permits issued, we have approximately 3, 264 homes rental homes that have been approved, some of which have been constructed. Others have not yet been completed. And so, yeah, I would say that we are on track for meeting that target of 3, 483 rental homes by 2028. I hope that's helpful. Great, thank you very much for that. Before I look to someone to move the Staff recommendation, are there any more questions? Councillor Litton. Thank you to you, Mayor. Just one more question. And it's to do with considering St. Andrews being a landmark heritage building. How did the park aid get built so close to it in the first place? Mr.

Batazzo, do you know that? So Tooth the mayor, no, I do not know that. And we've asked a similar question, but we haven't reviewed how that occurred in the first place. Do we know when there, do we know when the oldwn guidelines were established. Like this wouldn't have fit into the old town guidelines. Mr. President, clearly. So just to clear for, are you asking whether the parquet would have fit into the old time? Or this back application? The parquet. The current, what's currently there, like how my question is, how did that get approved? How did that get built? It's a great question. I'm not sure any of our stuff. Well, certainly none of them have been here that long, but do they know that material?

Well, so through the mayor, just through a quick Google search, it looks like it was completed in 1960, which would predate the oldwn design guidelines. Okay, so. I don't want to speculate here, but maybe that's the reason we adopted the old Tom Owltown guidelines because this is clearly not in sync with the heritage, the National Heritage Regulations, sorry, I forget the term for that. Okay, we'll leave it there. There you go. Some might argue that it is a little art decoey. But. Through YMR, but it's just how close it is. You know, it's unbelievable how close it is. Well, we'll save that for the comments.

Thank you. Another questions checking online. Nope. Does anyone wish to move Staff recommendation? Councillor Dell appears to want to move that. And Councillor Carried on his second name. Councillor Dell, over to you, discuss started. Sure, thank you. I'm going to support this project. When I first saw this project, I'm not sure when a couple of months ago. An early kind of designs. You know, my immediate thought was this is one of the most well - designed buildings we've had the opportunity to approve this term. I think there's a lot of really thoughtful consideration put into the design of this building, which staff have showed the massing and the massing was done in a really interesting way with the various step downs and kind of treed canopy on some of the lower podiums that I think really fits the vision for what Oldwn and Downtown is.

Like unique creative designs, that doesn't necessarily mean designs that are from that 1920s or whatnot, but I think the building is well designed. It fits. Most importantly for me, this is consistent with the official Community Plan. Council pass in OCP. The reason for passing an OCP is to give housing builders some assurance that what they're proposing is going to fit. It's a secured rental building, which fits the OCP. It's got ground floor commercial and aliens with the proposed to form a character. So we passed the OCP at this council. So it seems wrong to go back on a project that meets the OCP. I'm most excited that this hits and exceeds the family housing policy.

We've really been needing more two and three bedrooms. Um, I know some folks are going to talk about the heritage or what the look is. And I want to share a story about my daughter's best friend. Right now is living three kids in a one bedroom condo. Totally normal. My daughter went over there, played the other day. This was a normal thing that families are dealing with in the city. So as much as we might not like the look of this or might be a story too tall, I would encourage a lot of folks here to think what three kids in a one bedroom condo.

Is like. And what that's like for their quality of life versus perhaps, uh, your view of one extra story on a building. These three bedroom units are going to be huge for people and let alone the two bedrooms. Um. In terms of the actual heritage, I think this project in many ways supports heritage, the photo where it shows the back of the church with the spiral, the parquet is one of the most unappealing things I've ever seen in the city. And I think this plaza is really going to make this church beautiful. I think, I think the design of this is intended to support Oldwn, bring out the character of the church there, which I think is underappreciated and allow people to sit with a coffee and look at this beautiful little building. So I think this adds to Oldtown. The height is really interesting.

And I want to point out the Belmont building is just down on the corner of government and morph, I believe. It was built in 1912 and is three metre shorter. Over a hundred years ago, we built a building that's only three metre shorter. And here we are 100 years later, you know, concerned about the height of this building. The Belmo build is one of the most beautiful buildings in the city. It's always talked about how Iconic it is in the inner harbour. So, uh, I think we need to remember that three metres over 100 years is not that much of a difference. The sovereign building is on the same street, brown, just down the road.

It's 34 metres. Uh, I think it's a nice building in the downtown. So I'm not as concerned about the height. I think staff and the proponent have done a good job at mitigating the height. You know, I think maybe earlier versions were taller. This one actually fits. My concern is around the parking. Obviously the last of the parque, a couple of things. As someone just mentioned, the parquet is not heritage. If we're concerned about Oldtown, this is the last thing that should be an oldwn. It's a short parquet. It's at end of life. It's likely going to come down anyway. So we either rip the band - aid off now or do it in a couple of years. And that's really never worked out for the city. So I think the brown street parcade, the public one is just, it's one block over, uh, there's a lot of capacity in that parquet. The base centre has a lot of capacity. Um, and even with the

loss of parking, we are adding 300 more people that are going to be living there or more. So I think, I think that's something to be managed. And I'm pretty sure what staff said about working with the businesses to be allow them to purchase parking on the app for their clients. And I know I had a dentist downtown. And when you went in there, he gave you a free pass or some credits to a parquet. And that just might have to be how we work for the next little while. So overall, I think this is a really thoughtful and beautiful building that is just an absolute win for downtown on so many different ways. And I think the last thought put into it. So I'm very happy to support this. Thank you very much. Councillor Caradona is the second. Thanks Mayor. This one is very easy for me to support. And I think that there's a lot to recommend itself. And I think beginning with

the Heritage Components here and starting with the plaza and proximity to St. Andrews Church. I am not a member of the Religious Community at that church, but I am a member of the choir that practices there. And I have been on and off for years. And I've spent a lot of time in that church. And it's always struck me as absurd that there is a parcade 1. 5 metres away from it. I mean, talk about poor urbanism. It's just unbelievable that the council of the day in 1960 allowed that to happen. It just, just the absolute worst design. One of the reasons I emphasized earlier in the question period that this is a private parquet and that the city does not have the authority to prevent it from being demolished is simply to remind ourselves, the public and council that we're not really here to debate the future of the parquet. It's a private property owner who has the right to do what they want

with it. And it sounds everything I've seen and heard is that this thing is probably going to be demolished regardless of what else gets built there. So we're not having a debate about whether or not they're ought to be a parquet. That chip is sailed. What we are debating is what's going to replace it. And I can't really think of a better project to replace it. It will add 500 new people towntown. I think that we cannot ignore that fact. The province in many ways is given up on downtown. They're shedding real estate all the time. Remote and hybrid work is probably not going away thousands of people used to spend time downtown no longer do. Part of our vision, collectivision as a city for downtown Victoria is to bring more people there. Through housing, through activation, through arts and culture. But also mainly through housing. Those 500 people will shop at the shopwntown. They'll go to the coffee shop. They'll buy clothes. They will

activate the streets. They will improve. The vibrancy of Oldtown. But I particularly like this plaza. And what I like about it is I think that it's designed well. It'll have good sunlight. Yes. There's no guarantee in the future that another building to the South won't block some of that light. Hopefully that doesn't happen. There's only so much we can do about that. But having that mixed use context there means it's likely to activate the space. The septhed principles that are brought to bear are likely to make it a safe space. And most importantly, it's going to allow St. Andrews Church to breathe. And have a bit of context there that makes it the centrepiece and not a brutalist concrete parquet. Um, staff referenced something called the Heritage Landscapes policy. If I wrote it down correctly, or maybe I have the word slightly and correctly, which is not, it's about the context of the heritage acid, not the heritage acid itself, but the context in which

it exists. I think that the context here will allow that heritage asset to be foreground. And in that sense, this very much is a project that supports Heritage. The building itself to me looks sharp. And I know reasonable minds can disagree on aesthetics and we can never reproduce what Edwardian and Victorian buildings look like. We don't want to have some kind of Disneyland version of Downtown. We always have to move forward in terms of architectural style. But to my mind, it fits. I really like the green cladding, the green roofs, which we haven't really even discussed are incredible. And it's part of our new policies that really encourage green roofs. So the actual livability of this building seems to me quite high. And I think it is striking. I mean, it's certainly more visually stimulating the nine - tenths of the buildings that we've looked at this term, at least to my subjective eyes. In terms of the height, this certainly for me pushes it.

This is the upper limit of what I would want to see in Oldwn. I think some precedence has been set of a last century around what the height max might look like. And I'm always sensitive and cognizant of the fact that we need to be careful in setting precedent. And if folks recall, I was one of the people who had the biggest concerns about the tall buildings around St. Andrew's Cathedral. A couple of weeks ago, where I was worried that 20 - plus story buildings would really overshoed that heritage asset. So I'm very sympathetic to people who are worried about that. But for me, when I see the skyline renderings from the inner harbour that we looked at, to my mind, those 12 stories fit within the context of what's around it. It doesn't stick out like a sore thrum. It doesn't overshadow Oldtown. It doesn't overshadow downtown. I wouldn't want to see much bigger than this in Oldwn, but for me, I can live

with it. In particular, because it's going to bring 242 rentals downtown, it's going to bring this plaza. It's going to bring safety. It's going to bring activation. And I think in the end, it's going to make Downtown a better place to be and to live and to work. So for me, I'm really grateful that the proponents have brought this forward and have work collaboratively with staff and have landed on something that staff are recommending support. And I really hope to see this one move forward. I will just close by noting that I acknowledge the worries about parking from some of the downtown businesses. And I leave it in staffs capable hands to figure out what the solution may be there, noting that we do have multiple parqueades within blocks that are rarely full. And so it is going to be an adjustment. And we'll all work through it together. But I think in the end, Downtown Victoria will be a better place as a result

of this project. Thanks, Mayor. Thank you very much. Councillor Thompson. Thanks, Mir. Um, yeah, I'm, uh, happy to support this as well. This is, uh, important for downtown vitality as my colleague has mentioned with, with work from home, and, uh, what I've heard from, from a lot of business owners, uh, they're really missing, uh, their customers, um, so, you know, this is going to bring hundreds of potential customers for nearby businesses. It's going to have a plaza. And it's been a priority of this council to establish more public spaces downtown. Uh, it's going to have some ground floor retail, which will also attract more people to that area. Also agree with my colleague's comments about, uh, parking and particularly that parcade, uh, and that the owner could close it tomorrow. It's just not up to the city to make a decision on that. Um, I would mention that, yes, it's, it's going to be an adjustment for some folks who are currently using that lot.

Um, but in addition to the street parking that the city provides, uh, the mention of the public parcade in the next block, um, with spots vacant almost all of the time, uh, as well as there are two parcades on the same two private parcades on the same street, uh, both within 150 metres, uh, in either direction. And the one that's even closer, um, short block away at the other end of, of Broad Street at the base centre. So I think that there are some alternatives for people. Um, on the height, um, it's, it's higher than many of the buildings around it. But what we've seen from the renderings, uh, is that it's probably not going to be obtrusive or perhaps even noticeed, uh, depending on the direction you're looking at it from. Uh, it is providing much needed housing. We have, uh, 8, 000 units of latent demand. That's for people who are already living here in Victoria. This isn't for people coming in. But

we do have also an average population increase of between a thousand and a thousand five hundred people per year, despite the immigration upticks and downticks. That's just the, uh, long - term average. So, uh, you know, meeting, meeting part of that need is important. And this is a significant contribution. Uh, and it does also exceed the family housing targets that council determined as a priority. Uh, final comment, uh, staff have recommended this. They've done the analysis. They've done the work with the, uh, the applicant for the last year. Uh, they've certainly taken a much closer look than we have at this proposal. Uh, and repeatedly and for the reasons in their report, I support this moving forward. Thanks Mayor. Thank you very much. Anybody else.

Thank you. It's fascinating. To take a look at the comparators that we did for this. And one of the comparators is 608 Brown, the sovereign. That building has been there now for 13 years. Um, if you go back in history, it was a split vote of council. It was seven to two in favor. Um, but it was against the recommendation of staff. At the time. And the staff, uh, were concerned rightly, I think about height as it related to decap. Um, now 13 years later, I think we see that the sovereign works. Um, it and staff have had a chance to reflect through that. And now come with a recommendation to support this. I am open very much to this. I share the concern that some people have around height. And I think that this does push it. But what you have to do is recognise that this, in some ways, is a trade - off between that Plaza area that opens up the breathing

space for St. Andrews Church. I do think, and it's been referenced a couple of times that the three parking stalls adjacent to the church need to be moved. If you're going to get the full benefit of opening up that breathing space, I don't think having three cars shuffled in the middle of a church and public plaza make much sense. So I know that there was a thought around wording that could be used to make that amendment. I think Mr. Batenzo has the wording for that. And we can deal with that as an amendment later. But to the, what we have here, I think it's what we have to grapple with is the trade - off that we see between. The height provision that's being supported here. And what we see as the breathing space or the room for the backside or the offside of St.

Andrews Church. And I think that that's wholly supportable in this instance. It is interesting to me as well that it's been referenced earlier. We quite often talk about the Belmont building at eight stories. It is the densest building, I think, in the city, certainly in the downtown, because of the setback relationships. It goes right to the property edge. Um, but it is downhill from the area. So we can't compare their eight stories to this 11 stories. This is, this is higher, 12 stories. Um, so they are significantly different from each other. But I think in terms of the community benefit that's accrued from this, yes, we've spoken volumes about the housing and it's an enormous benefit, particularly the two and three bedroom units. But I think that the architecture is particularly good in this example.

I love the articulation of the building itself, but it's buying that plaza area and allowing people to revel in the architectural brilliance of the backside of St. Andrews Church. So I will support this. But I look forward to the amendment coming forward on the three parking stalls. Thank you, very much. Anybody else. How's your Loton. Thanks and to you, Mayor. This has been really difficult for me of, you know, really, really struggled with this because oldwn is such an important part of the city. And we've talked about that a lot. And we do have regulations for that, that I hesitate to veer out of. And we're also still in a time when we're, you know, reviewing the heritage review and the Heritage Experts need to weigh in. And we're still working on decap. So that, um, concerned me. And we're not quite sure where that's going. So I was really, um, yeah, I just, it was very difficult for me because of course I'm always

supportive of new purpose - built rental, and particularly the two and three bedrooms that are desperately needed. And, um, you know, it's too soon to go here, but the Affordable Housing, Revitalization Tax Exemption, I'd be hoping that the proponents would take advantage of that to get some affordability into this project. Yeah. So I was very, very much on the fence. But St. Andrews is landmark heritage and it's unbelievable to me that the backside of it has been basically, um, unavailable to the view of the public for 60 years, 65 years. And opening that up to be able to show off this heritage gem, I think.

Is part of the reason where I'm leaning now towards supporting this. I think it's that, you know, 12 stories is kind of the limit for me as well on Oldwn, but using the examples of the sovereign and the Belmont building, you know, we've, we've, it's not out of, out of scale with that. And it's also on the edge of Oldwn. So yeah, very hair splitting decision here. But I also want to talk about the parking as well because there are the businesses in that community around, um, broad and Belmont have really brought that up as a concern. And I'm just going to read out a few examples of things that they thought could work. And maybe this is something that, that, you know, staff or myself or other councillors might want to get behind. So they had suggested reviewing parking usage by day data by day of the week. So particularly Mondays and Fridays to offer free or reduced rate parking to stimulate slower business

days. So that's something, you know, is some smaller creative solutions that could help the parking situation or explore the feasibility of short - term and mixed - use parking in commercial areas due to underutilization. So for example, loading zones, I think there's three loading zones on Brown that could be used for more than just commercial purposes potentially. And looking at changing the time of short of time limits to park. So making those one and a half hour time limits to two hours. And then maybe potentially improvements at the Brownton Street parquet because I have heard, and I'm not sure about this because I haven't been in the Brownton street parquet for years, but there were some complaints that it's, you know, cleanliness and safety issues.

So maybe there are some things we can do to help mitigate some of the parking issues that the businesses in that area are concerned about. But the reality is, is this parquet is coming down, whether this application passes counsel or not. That's not in question. And we have no control over that. So by a very, very, very thin margin, I am going to support this project today. Thank you. Thank you very much. Anybody else. Councillor Hammond. Council Cardner. Thanks, Mayor. There's a lot about this proposal that I support. I support redevelopment of the site. I support the purpose - built rental housing. I support the family - sized units. I support the commercial space at street level. And I particularly support the sustainable public plaza besides St. Andrew's Church, especially when you see the difference, it will make compared to the parking ramp that exists now. So this is not a choice between this proposal and nothing. My concern is the scale. This proposal isn't

slightly higher. The planning framework for this site contemplates a maximum height of about 15 metres. We are being asked to approve more than 38 metres and a 12 - story building. The proposed density is also substantially above what is contemplated for this part of Oldwn. Those are not minor variances. I recognise that this particular location can probably accommodate more height than some other places of oldwn. They Heritage Advisory panel recognised that as well. But the panel also concluded unanimously that this proposal goes too far. What I found particularly persuasive was that the panel did not dismiss the project. Members described it as thoughtful. They liked many of its architectural features and the plaza. Their concern was essentially the same as mine. A good development can still be too large. My vote is not against housing.

Voting against 12 stories does not mean I support zero stories. It means that I believe council has responsibility to distinguish between reasonable additional density and too much density for a particular location. I would like to see this applicant come back with a material - y shorter building while preserving as much as possible of what is good here. The rental housing family - sized homes, commercial uses, high quality design and especially the plaza. Our planning policies should not be treated as an absolute barriers to change. But neither should they become meaningless whenever an attractive project asks us to substantially exceed them. I believe there is a very good development waiting to be built on this site.

I do not believe the 12 - story version is it. For those reasons, I will be voting to decline the application. Um, and I want one to add that if this proposal is defeated, it doesn't look like it's going to be that I would put forward a motion asking staff to go back to the applicant asking them to come back with a similar proposal, but not as much height. Thanks, Mayor. Thank you very much. Just to clarify before I go to Councillor Gardner, is it your intention to try and raise emotionalizing and opposition to the outcome? Should it be defeated? I just don't think it's going to be defeated. There. Okay. I would just point out that that would be procedurally unacceptable. There you go.

We'll just deal with that at the time. Sure. Hold that thought. Councillor Gardner. First, it was talking about all the amendment. When is the time the amendment comes forward? It would be at any time before we vote. Please now. No one yet has suggested an amendment. Okay. Please no. Would you like to move an amendment, Councillor Gardner? Okay. Do you have wording for the amendment? I think. This one's been mentioned many times the staff does. Mr. Patenzo, uh, inappropriately may I add, uh, counsel is asking you to provide the wording for an amendment. Do you wish to do that. You need not, by the way.

That is not your job. Sorry, through the mayor. Is this an amendment for the parking on the adjacent property that we're seeking? Yes. So, um, some language was sent to our administrative staff here. And I can read that out. Uh, so after Section two, item GVIII, add item H with the following text that staff explore with the applicant expanding the proposed plaza onto the St. Andrew's Church property and replacing the three parking stalls on the church property to be within the proposed parquet through an agreement with the church and the applicant. Just one second, please. So just to be clear, the intent of that would be to remove the existing. Indication on the plans of one parking spall and allowing that to be, become part of the plaza and replacing that with three parking stalls within the parquet. So through the mayor, there are currently three surface parking stalls within the St. Andrew's Church property.

And it would be to expand the plaza to the face of the church, uh, remove those stalls and then provide alternative stalls, uh, within the proposed parquet. Just to be clear on the, um, plans on the South side when you look at the plaza, there is a box that's called St. Andrews Extension. Is that different than what you're describing? That's not intended to be for. Parking. Through the mayor, I believe that St. Andrew's extension would not be contemplated with this motion. So what is that? I thought that was the parking spot. I believe that's a small storage area that's used by the church. It's a building as opposed to surface parking. Very good. All right.

That's clear. Thank you. So you're intending to, um, essentially give them three parking spolls in the parquet. Okay. Is there a seconder for that amendment? Thanks. Councillor Coleman is second again. There you go. Sorry to fortunate. Can just rate a point, which is that, as worded, it says staff explore with the applicant, but the church should be involved in that exploration because it's not the applicant's property. So shouldn't say that staff explore with the applicant. And the church. Well, I believe that, um, Mr. Batanza's language actually is suggesting that it is the applicant who speaks with staff because the proposal, as I understand it, is that three of the stalls in the applicants parcade would be dedicated to the church. But if I'm, if I'm understanding correctly, the, the thought here is to actually extend a public, well, they would be an SRW Plaza onto land owned by the church. Essentially extending the plaza onto the church's property. That's my understanding of what's being contemplated

here and in exchange for that, they might get three parking spaces elsewhere. Mr. Patanzo, I don't believe that's what you're suggesting, is it? Yes, to the mayor, the, the proposition is that the plaza area include those three parking stalls on the church's property. Which are not included now. Which are not included now, correct? I see. Mayor. Yes. If you could put slide 18 up again, that would clarify it. Sure. Let's do that before we look for a second here. That's the one I have on my screen. Yep, that's the one I have on my screen. So Mr. Patanza, can you clarify it based on this drawing exactly the areas that you're describing in the amendment.

What's current and what would be changed by this amendment? Through the mayor. Do I have a laser? I don't. I don't think they do. Oh, it doesn't. No. You'll have to use your words. Use your words. So yes, your words. There you go. Uh, so, uh, through yourself there, if we, if we look at this drawing, um, that there's a space between the St. Andrews Church and the plaza. And the lying drawn there. That's the property boundary. There's a grey area within this drawing that accommodates parking at this time. And so it's parking and it's a bit of sort of sort of, uh, interstitial space as well. And so what is being proposed is that the plaza actually doesn't have a boundary that corresponds to the property boundary. But instead a but the existing church.

Within that area, there are three parking stalls, which the church would be looking to have, uh, provided elsewhere, which would be in the underground parking. Right. And so just pointing going back to one of the comments by council member, does that mean then your amendment requires consultation with the church. So through the mayor, the way that that motion was suggested was that, um, that consultation would occur, but it's a private land use matter between the applicant and the church as opposed to the city consulting directly with the church itself. And so that's what the motion has been drafted as. But saying that there would be a requirement. And I have to look at our emotion again here. That this plaza area is intended to have a statue right of way over it to permit public access. That statutory right of way would have to extend also to properly, uh, that belongs to the church. So we would need to have that conversation. The amendment rather

back up. And Mr. Patenzo, if you could clarify based on your suggested wording, what, if anything, needs to change to accommodate what you just said. I believe through the mayor of yourself that it was just added to the end of the sentence, um, uh, the proposed parque through an agreement with the church and the applicant and the city, uh, would suffice. Very good. With that then. Is there a seconder for that amendment. Councillor Coleman is seconding the amendment. Councillor Gardner, would you like to speak to your amendment. This makes sense. Thank you. Councillor Coleman. And I think you'd like to add. No. Okay. Anyone else on the amendment. That is just item H in the bold language. No. Okay. Although I'll just meet check with councillor Thompson. Yeah. He's good. Uh, all those in favor of the amendment. Is anyone opposed. That would be unanimous.

Councillor Gardner, you still have the floor now on the main amended motion. Thank you. This is a very interesting attractive billing that's being proposed. When I saw the schematics in January, I thought, wow, the design was actually superb. And, uh, and especially the nod to the end, um, architecture. And while many has spoken about parking so far, my real concern is a trend to consider broader city goals as rationale to disregard or set aside Oldwn guidelines and expectations for respect of oldwn and how important it is. That is the most troublesome thing for me in this whole, uh, application and the staff report. The height, the density and an FSR of close to six to one is asking too much for this site. And a process, as I mentioned, presents a real threat to Oldtown.

This proposal, um, if approved sets, as I mentioned, a bad precedent. Now I'm going to just read from an email and we received this morning. I don't know the person. I haven't had a chance to get permission. So I won't give his name. The downtown corps are planning on zoning bylaw. I generally limit new construction additions to Oldwn to 15 metres. These policies are recently reaffirmed by council through the OCP process and are intended to preserve oldwns human scale, historic urban form, and the gradual transition in building height from their waterfront through Oldwn toward Douglas Street. Councils continued adherence to these policies has helped maintain the scale of old towns. Many heritage building about ninety five percent of which are five stories or less. The current proposal does not appear to align with that objective.

This proposal follows the threat which was raised a few meetings ago. The threat to Oldwn. The public is feeling the impact of the new OCP. Setting aside OCP decap and oldwn guidelines at this time. We'll further erode public trust. In this part of Oldtown near the historic buildings, a density lower, uh, to at most five to one. And perhaps even the eight stories which has mentioned would have been supportable for me. But that is not what is before us today. In summary, the proposal is height and degree to which it departs from the established framework intended to protect oldwns character is not supportable. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you very much. Anybody else? I will just add a few words. I won't repeat what many of my colleagues had said. Have said that I've been very eloquent as always. I do support this moving forward for many of the reasons that have already expressed. I'll just touch on two that I don't think have been expressed

yet. The thing about this for me, which actually compels it over that line, that fine line is actually the comprehensive nature of the analysis that Staff of outlined. They have, in my opinion, uh, considered a wide variety of different policies, applications, practicalities, realities and goals. And among all of those have found balance. Which I think are questionable. There are aspects of this, which I think are outstanding and quite exemplary of what I believe a city should look like. And the experience of that, that it creates for its residence. That being said, the balance points that have been found, uh, with Staffs analysis, comprehensive analysis of this in the end for me comes down to being able to accept this and move forward with it. The other piece that I don't think anyone's as mentioned is I actually think this is remarkably elegant. It is a very confined space. And it's a space which has some intriguing history, I think, as I just be pointed out

by some questions. And certainly it's current spaces occupied by a very unique structure, I guess, which none of us can really figure out why it was put there given all of the different policies of the time, but nevertheless. What is being proposed here, I think, brings a degree of elegance that is entirely suitable for that location, particularly as it is compared to some of the immediately surrounded buildings, the magnobly hotel, the sovereign, the Belmont, a variety of others, including the union club, just down the hill. Uh, and so I actually think this is a remarkable adaptation of a new 21st century version of all of that elegance in that design. And I think for all of the reasons that have been expressed earlier around housing, around residents, around oversight around all of the things that have been mentioned, uh, this is quite a lovely proposal and I'm quite happy to support it. With that then, it would appear, oh, Councillor Kim, sorry, I didn't see

your hand. Go ahead. Go ahead. It's okay. Uh, through the chair, um, I would just also add beyond what's been said, the fact that it is purpose - built rental and offers so many housing options actually not only activates and provides more residences downtown, but more mixed income and mixed family styles, which diversifies what Downtown will look like. And that to me is the kind of Victoria want to see moving forward. Thanks. Thank you very much. Leave everyone's head a chance to question and speak. So all those in favor of the application. Councillor Dell. Councillor Kim, Councillor Cardona, Councillor Loton, myself, Councillor Coleman and Councillor Thompson in opposition, Councillor Hammond and Councillor Gardner. Noting two in opposition, that application is approved at committee and I suspect we'll return to us in due course when all of these different thresholds have been met. Thank you very much, Staff. Very much appreciate your presentations and all of the work that went into getting us here. We'll move

on now to item G2, which is a rezoning application and development permit with variances application for the property at 1114 Rockland Avenue. And once our staff settle themselves, we'll turn it over to them for a presentation and introductions.

Welcome. Good afternoon, Mayor Council. Uh, Patrick Carroll, senior planner with development services. The application I'll be presenting today as a rezoning and a development permit. With variances application. For 114 Rockland Avenue. The proposal is to amend the GRD1, General Residential District. To add hotel as a permitted use. And to increase density. To 2. 35 to one Floor Space Ratio. The amendment is required in order to construct a sick story. 30 guest room, hotel. So moving to the matters for council's consideration, uh, they include the supportability of the Rezoning, as well as the proposed variances. And also the consistency of the proposed design. With applicable design guidelines.

So first here is site context. You'll note the location near the corner of Rockland and cook. And this red line denotes the boundary of the downtown core area. You'll note the property is along this boundary. Here's the aerial photography. The surrounding area is comprised of a mix of commercial and residential uses in a variety of built forms. Here is a 3D aerial. First, this is the vacant subject property. And here are three properties along Cook Street. The first two are from the corner. Our heritage designated commercial conversions. 10 - 15 COOC is a five - story rental residential. That was constructed in 2022. In addition, to the north and east, there are three and four - story apartment buildings. Here's the subject property. Looking north towards some of the mentioned residential buildings. Here to the west, uh, this is the rear yard of the three already mentioned Cook Street properties. You'll note the paved surfaces along Rockland Avenue. Moving now to the east. This is

1126 Rockland. It is a four story walk up apartment and it's double fronting. You'll note in the lower photo, the large sequoia. Tree that is near the boundary line between these two properties. It is proposed for retention and is noted in your Committee of the Holt report. To the north, now this is the north of Budding property at 1137 Mir Street. This is a three - story. Six unit Strata development that was constructed in 2009. So now we can move to the official Community Plan. The subject property is identified as within a priority growth area of the residential fabric. However, as the thematic map shows, the property is also adjacent to the downtown core area.

So moving to OCP policies now. Primarily residential uses, as well as limited commercial, our envisioned for the residential fabric. Up to six stories generally within a priority growth area. However, noting the adjacency to the downtown core, this opens up more of a range of commercial uses, which does include tourist uses. I would note that this is reinforced in the OCP, which emphasizes the importance of expanding tourism assets across the city. Uh, outlining a specific target of 1, 500 rooms by 2035. So moving to the design objectives within the OCP. As you're aware, the perimeter block form is prioritized within the residential fabric. This is where generally open spaces adequate and located within the rear yard.

In assessing this application, although the 6 - story building height is consistent with what is envisioned in a priority growth area. And there is rear yard green space, as well as a rooftop amenity that is shared. The proposal does come short of the desired 8 metre rear yard setback that is considered appropriate in this location. Moving to the rezoning and development policy. Which supplements the OCP, with general guidance for rezonings. The policy discourages development that could result in orphaned adjacent sites. This is not considered a concern in this application. As I would reiterate that to the west, our two heritage designated commercial buildings. And to the east as an existing walk - up apartment that is double fronting as noted, but also is exceeding 30 metres in width. Also consistent with the policy. The proposal includes sustainable mobility options. It also includes a mix of indoor and outdoor common areas. And there are design mitigations most notably step backs above the fourth story, which I'll

cover in a following slide. As noted, there is the eight metre rear yard setback that staff would recommend, uh, to further mitigate impacts. So here is the site plan. There is a dedicated lobby. This is for check - in and with the service attendant. There is a two - way parking entrance into limited parking within the building. And there is a separate guest entry which provides direct access to the elevators. Here is the rear yard setback. It is at 5. 4 metres as proposed and as noted, eight is recommended. Here is the West Side setback. It is at two metres. At the ground level. And apologies for there is a typo there. Uh, that should say three metres above the fourth story. So the step - in is actually above the fourth story. Apologies for that. Going to the east side, this is near zero lot line for the first story, but this widens out to 2. 4 metres above the first story. There are

additional step - in locations along this building face that are more minor. Here's the front yard setback, and it is set at 4. 1 metres. And I would note that it is necessitated by the proposed pad - mounted transformer. Which is located in the front yard. So here now is the landscape plan. You will see appropriately plantings and trees are concentrated in the rear - yard area. There is a lesser extent of park of plantings along the west side yard. There's also two proposed street trees. And you'll know the large circle passing through a portion of the building footprint. That is the expected root zone for the notable sequoia - tree already mentioned. And as noted, it is proposed for retention. In terms of numbers, in terms of open - lot space, it is above the 40 percent for the GRD - 1 at 46.

5 percent. Lock coverage is at 57 percent. And it does meet the minimum contiguous landscaped area required in the zone. Uh, and it's actually at 75 square metres. And of course, is located in the rear yard area. As noted, there is recommended revision to the rear yard setback, and this provides you a visual of that location. I would clarify that it is a set of the rear set of stairs, as well as bathrooms to some of the smaller hotel rooms are located within this encroaching area. Now we can move to the elevations. This, of course, is the street fronting elevation. You'll note the building height at 19 metres. And you can see some of the architectural features such as the trellis and the sunshade that is proposed for the rooftop. Moving to the back of the building, this is the north elevation. So this is facing 1137 mirrors. And here is a good view of the rooftop amenity. I would note it is over 300

square metres in total. It's quite large and does consume the majority of the rooftop space. Here now is the east elevation. So this is facing the four - story walk - up apartment. That is located on Rockland Avenue. And here is the West elevation. Again, it is facing the two heritage designated commercial conversions. In terms of materiality, the two dominant materials are pre - finished metal in a wood grain finish. As well as painted stucco in two colours. There's also already mentioned some accents in wood. And of course, there's aluminum guards for the balconies as well as the rooftop. So as your report indicates this property is within DPA1. So the General Urban Design Guidelines do apply. Consistent with the guidelines, the proposal includes well articulated building facade, particularly along the street. A recess garage door. As well as upper level step backs to mitigate the impact of the proposed height. There's also higher quality materials, considered appropriate to the context. And I'd already mentioned

the variety of features to add visual interest. However, as noted, the recommended revisions are most notably to reduce the portion of the building encroaching into the rear yard 8 metre area. And there are more minor revisions also recommended, including reduction in the width of the vehicle entrance leading into the parquet. And also, we did encourage an in - building transformer as opposed to the pad - mounted transformer. However, that is not contained in your motion as the applicant decline to pursue that option due to costs. Finally, we can go to a few of the renderings. This is the rendering from the street. And here is more of a contextual rendering showing the building and relation to some of the nearby residential buildings. To conclude, the proposal is considered consistent with the use and height and visioned in the OCP. And further, the proposal would advance key OCP objective to expand on tourism capacity. As noted, there are the recommended motion does include revisions, most notably

to the increased rear lot line setback. And therefore, it is recommended that the application be advanced to bylaw readings, subject to the revision's contained in the motion. Thank you, and I'll take a questions. Thank you, Mr. Carroll. Before we go to Councillor Gardner, who asked this to be removed from consent, one clarification, you mentioned in your presentation that removing that space there in the Red Block would have an impact on the provision of bathrooms in the hotel rooms. Does that mean that it's possible to do that. You noted one of the revisions that you suggested was declined. The other two, I presume, are doable. Including this one. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you for the question.

Uh, yes, to clarify, so that what is occupying this space is actually bathrooms that extend past the smallest of the guest rooms towards the rear. There's also the rear stairs. We have had discussions with the applicants related to this, um, condition contained. And it is certainly possible to redesign the bathrooms back into the building as it was initially shown that way in previous iterations. However, the applicant did indicate that the removal of the stairs and the redesigning that into the footprint of the building behind that eight metre setback line would be more challenging. And that was why they wish to be advanced to council, and they would have to further consider, uh, what can be done there. A quick estimate is that somewhere in the realm of maybe five guest rooms could be lost to pull all of that portion of the encroachment back within the building footprint. Very good, thank you. Uh, Councillor Gardner, you asked for this to be removed from consent. Why

don't you start by asking me your questions? Thank you. Thank you for the presentation at Clarify a lot. Really did. Several questions. Would this hotel have been stacked 24 - 7. Do you know that, Mr. Carroll? Uh, through to the mayor, thank you for that question. Uh, contained in our zoning bylaw, there is a requirement that it be staffed and that there'd be an available attendant at all hours of the day. So the applicant has tailored the proposal to meet that definition. So the answer would be, um, yes. Okay, available means on - site. Mr. Girl. Uh. Through to the mayor, I would have to maybe defer to one of my colleagues that might have more specific knowledge on that. Mr. Handy. Uh, thank you, Jim Handy acting assistant directed balance. So I can't hear you. Sorry, Jim Handy acting assistant director development services, um, through the language in the zoning bylaw is left deliberately flexible to allow hotel operators to put forward different kind

of management programs in place to manage the property and provide attendance on site. So, uh, whilst the lobby has been provided, um, an attendant could be provided in many different ways. Um, so there's no guarantee, and the zoning by a law that the attendant is on site, um, 24 hours, um, seven days a week. They could put forward a different proposal, all that stuff would review to demonstrate compliance with the zoning biolog. So the answer is no. Okay, thank you. Where is Staff parking. Miss Carol, do you know that? Or is there staff parking on this site? Through to the mayor, so the parking count is based on the use. And so unlike a residential use where there's specified visitor parking as well, um, as unit parking, we do not have designated stalls except for, uh, accessibility parking. Um, so we don't have that, um, outlined, and, uh, I haven't been given that level of clarification by the applicant. Thank you. So no staff necessarily

and no parking for staff. Where is the waste management in this. Girl. Uh, thank you for the question. Through to the mayor, it is located in the lowest level. So the first story of the building, and it is located adjacent to the vehicle parking. Inside. Through to the mayor, that's correct. And you're thinking of narrowing a driveway. Uh, through to the mayor, thank you for that question. This was something in consultation with our transportation team. Um, we are recommending that there could be a reduction in this dry vial with, at least for the, um, driveway crossing portion. So that's the portion that is adjacent to the planted street trees. So staff had an inclination that that if possible would benefit, um, the street tree is being proposed. And so we know certainly that it is feasible for the driveway crossing portion. And whether that reduction and width can carry forward right to the garage door is something we'll have to have a discussion with the

applicant in their architect on with waste vehicles, I hope. Okay. Um, slide number 21. Okay, what is the, uh, setback on the adjoining property to the sidewalk and on this proposed property to the sidewalk. Skill. COUR. Through to the mayor, could you clarify which adjoining property we'd be speaking of the one walkup apartment on Auckland? Yes. I just give me one moment.

Okay. So this will be an approximation because I am just using my mapping, um, but from what I can see to be the building face. We have. Approximately seven metres. Which. And it believes it does appear that the entrance is a little bit less. So it would be, let me get that for you as well. So about five and a half metres, it appears from the front entry to the fronting property line on Rockland Avenue. And on the fourth story. That's on the fourth story. Okay. And how much on the proposed one? Uh, so it is just over four metres through the marriage, just over four metres, 4. 1 actually. So this will jump forward one and a half metres further than the other. What is they set back of the building next to the four story. I'm looking at the whole street scape to see if this interrupts it. So just to be clear, you're asking for the building that's not in this picture? That's to the east? Yes. Yes. So that

just for those watching through to the mayor, that would be 1144 Rockland. And I'm seeing it's a bit further set back, closer to seven metres for that. So this will really change the street skate. Okay. Um, how given the schematic of zero on the, um, you side, I guess it is. How about they have access to the property with zero setback. For repairs or anything else. Uh, through to the mayor, thank you for that question. Maybe I will just go back to a site plan as a visual. So the, in terms of that side, so the zero near zero lot line side, that is only for the first story. And it would be for that guest entry. So you would not be able to walk down that side, um, but there is a full pedestrian access on the opposite on the west side that does allow you to go around to the rear of the building. And there is even provision for a short path

for maintenance purposes to the service of the building. I'm thinking of repair for the east side. Painting, repair, a leak. Should there be something that needs to be done to the east side of the building? How would they access that? Uh, through the mayor, I can see some of my colleagues are leaning in. They may have more information than I on that. Thank you through the mayor Charlotte Wayne, manage of neighbourhood development planning. Um, the application has been reviewed by our permits and inspections department and the proposal would need to meet all the relevant building code requirements in terms of separation space. Um, so, so, uh, there would be a solution for maintenance. Sorry. We would expect there would be a solution for maintenance. Because the poser would be required to meet building code requirements from engineering have determined that there is a manageable way for that work to be done given the application. So our stuff of the mayor, all we could indicate is

when our, our applications are reviewed by various departments. Our permits and inspections team did review this and they did not indicate as specific concern. That's as much as I could say to that. Good engineering, please reply. Mr. Doyle, do you have anything to add. Sorry, did we bear nothing to her? Nothing to add? Okay. Councillor. You mentioned the backstairwell how many stairwells are there in the building. How many stairways? Ms. Carol? Uh, through to the mayor, there is a single elevator, but there are two stairs as required under the building code. And the, the encroaching portion is the rear stair, of course. Thank you. Um.

I'm going by some comments we got from people who wrote into us. Uh, what is the most common room size. Down to the mayor. Just give me one second. I do have this all noted. Uh, so through to the mayor, I'll give you a bit of a summary. So seven of the 30 units are less than 250 square feet. There are 10 that are less than 300 square feet. The majority of them 15 of them are with between 300 and 450 square feet. And there are five that are more than 500 square feet. And the two that are above 600. And some of them do contain two rooms. Although the majority would be single room.

Yeah. So I would think so. That square footage. It'd be single. So the restaurant, who are the intended clientele given this small size of these rooms and no real facilities on site. Mr. Girl? Uh, sure. That's part of the material consideration of the application, but you're welcome to venture an opinion. Uh, through to the mayor, thank you. Uh, all I could weigh in is what was provided in terms of the letter to Marin Council and discussions with the applicant. And in terms of target market, there were no details specified about a specific target market, but rather that there would be demand for, um, more of a boutique type hotel with kitchenets and this format, um, and that there would be a market for that. Are the 250 or less than 250 square feet? Uh, going to have kitchenets. Uh, through to the mayor, uh, the application and the proposed plans do show at least some level of kitchenette for all units. I do know that

the counter space and the size certainly is relative to the size of the unit as well. So, and we don't receive details about specific appliances at this phase. Well, they have closets. Mr. Carroll. Through the mayor, I believe they do. I would have to go, I'll double check that because maybe it's possible, um, maybe some of the smaller ones do not. Okay. Given the food service, what is the anticipated activity. Or use of the rooftop open space since we don't have real kitchens and a lot of them. So you don't have fridges. So what's the use of the rooftop when the food services? So you're not going to kind of wander up there for a meal. Ms. Carol. Uh, through to the mayor, again, these are just not details that we receive. I do note the kitchen appliances or any of those aspects on the roof. So the roof is really just a large area for gathering. And I think it would come down to

the hotel operator to furnish it as the, as they would. Thank you. The vote to our operator that isn't on sight. Okay. I've we discussed the waste. I had another question story. It was out of order. The ways pickup area is going to be inside thinking of narrowing the driveway yet with trucks humans can be a truck during the pickup. It's going to have a turning radius that may interrupt with the street. Will it? I mean, how are we dealing with a turning radius going into a more narrow driveway and going in there for waste pickup. Girl? Uh, thank you for the question. Through to the mayor, I can say that the turn radius of the park installs and the drive I'll lead into it.

We're all reviewed as part of a parking study that the applicant had submitted in 2015. So I would lean on my, um, my, my colleagues in transportation as they may be able to elaborate. But I can say that the, um, turning radius, uh, was analysed and not considered an issue in this case. Um, there were a few iterations of parking that I do believe did relate to, um, stalls that were not as maneuverable. And those have been since removed. Thank you. I was thinking of stalls. I was thinking of the trucks for waste pickup. Mr. Kenny, do you have anything to add to this as to the accessibility from service vehicles for this particular design.

Uh, through the mayor. So typically for most sites, what we're seeing is like a, like a swamper truck. So a smaller pickup truck that attends sites to move the bins to a place at the larger waste collection vehicle can get to them. Um, generally we're looking again, storage, um, on site. In this case, you know, what we see in many buildings is, um, designated, you know, spots on the roadway where we're seeing bins be collected, accommodating. For a large full size garbage pickup, you know, would have likely have major implications on the building itself, just given the height and width and other issues. So, um, and the narrower driveway in this case allows us to plant two boulevard trees, which we saw as beneficial. Thank you. So were there be dedicated space on the street for the truck to wait while the little vehicle goes in and picks up the waist? Uh, through the mayor.

So typically what we're seeing is, you know, the, the vehicle in front is, you know, is a ways ahead of that larger truck. Um, and, you know, and does circles of the block and pulling out multiple buildings. So they're, well, they work together in tandem. Um, you know, they're not necessarily there at the same time, you know, backing up and moving together. Um, typically what we're asking is also for any of these buildings that in the interim that those bins are put on private property. So not stored on the roadway, though in this case, um, we don't have that dedicated on the building site, but would be a requirement that we would ask for. I'm a bit confused. So the truck that's a bigger truck rather than one that's moving the stuff out. Where will it park. To pick up the load. Mr. Kenny? Um, so the truck that is actually picking up the waist would be somewhere else. So the bin would not be

stored on Rockland. Um, what we require, sorry, I'm just getting notes from my planning team here. Um, but typically what we would see is bins going to, uh, you know, somewhere offsite. So not on the arterial road and in what we ask, it requires it to be on a private lot somewhere else. So we don't know where that bin would be when it goes from the smaller truck to the larger track, but the larger truck would not be there on Rockland servicing the site directly. Is there a place in the city that weed. I'm getting quite confused by this. Sorry. Through the marriage, this isn't one that we regulated this time. Though, you know, the storage of bins on the public street, even for pickup is currently contrary to the bylaw. I'm sorry. I need clarification. So you've got a little truck that takes things out. I know this because of our building, but you need a place for the big truck. So that big

truck could be wearing, okay? I mean, where's the bigger truck that they're going to take things to. Mr. Kenney, can you, in a simple fashion, describe exactly how this will work? Or Mr. Carroll. Is one of you. Through the mayor, so the small truck, uh, would pick up that bin and take it to a private lot somewhere else. And we do not regulate where that is happening currently for say multifamily buildings such as this. Um, and then they would service it on their own business practice. So that could be somewhere in Rock Bay. That could be somewhere else in the city, a surface parking lot where they have an agreement, but we don't know. So we just regulate again that the garbage is there and that they're not, uh, legally allowed to store it on the city right of way. Okay. Um, thank you. Um, the project data table under existing zone density suggests an amenity contribution for the shifter density from one to two.

What was that amenity amount, even if it is not an effect now, what was that amount before the change of use. Give me one second just to bring that up. And that's in the zoning under the GRD one zone. Mr. Handy. Thank you Meroralton. And through you, sorry. I just had this on my screen so I can speak to it. And this related to a form of proposal for residential development on the site. It's a different proposal. Um, the base density that was allowed, um, and under the zone associated with that proposal was one - to - one FSR up to two FSR. If they're provided an amenity contribution to 144, 000 dollars, um, and also entered into a housing agreement to secure two of the residential units as below market affordable housing. Okay. And that, of course, wasn't realised because they didn't proceed, correct?

Thank you. Okay. A few weeks ago, 84 million dollar benefits through an attacks exemption was approved for hotels. What might be the exemption for this hotel? Mr. Carroll, is that something you can answer? Uh, through to the mayor, perhaps my colleagues could weigh in. I'm not aware. All I do know is I followed that in the council discussion and did make the applicant aware of the status of discussions, as I understood them, but that would be the extent of my discussions. Ms. Thompson, is that something that you have been involved with at that conversation? Um, through you mayor. So the council will still have to consider a bylaw for this program. So this program actually does not exist yet. We do have council direction to bring something forward. And at that time, uh, that would outline the program objectives as well as, uh, which properties would be eligible. So it is too early to say whether this property would be eligible under that program, um,

until the time that council actually considers the bylaws. Very good. Thank you. Okay. So just to clarify though, rather than the city receiving an amenity of a hundred and what was it. 144, 000 dollars. Uh, there's going to probably be some tax exemption, not yet a determined, which means we're talking quite a bit of difference in here in the use has created much more, shall we say, um, obligation on behalf of the taxpayer to subsidize this building in one way or another. So I just want to make sure that I have that right. The question there, Councillor? Okay. No, I just want to clarify. Is that, is that interpretation more or less correct. Down that sounds a little bit like a financial question. Um, through Marisol, it will depend on that ultimate bylaw program by law, that council will consider. So at this point we can't say whether this property would be eligible or not.

Thank you. I'd like to make an amendment. Now the time there. Uh, it's not on the floor yet. We're still doing. Okay. What an ears on the floor. I'll have an amendment. Thank you. Council Heyman, do you had some questions. That's mayor I do. The OCP describes this area's residential fabric primarily intended for residential use. What is the planning principle that makes a 30 room hotel appropriate here simply because the site is close to downtown. Mr. Carroll. Uh, through to the mayor, thank you for that question. Uh, so as noted in the presentation as well as the council report, um, we do look at the OCP in terms of less in terms of hard boundary lines and do kind of consider walkability and proximity to various, um, either villages or the downtown in this case.

And so in this case, given that the property is directly abutting the downtown core area, uh, where a full range of commercial type uses, including tourism accommodations would be not just supported, but encouraged. We did feel that the, uh, and determined that the, um, the OCP does support this location for a standalone commercial, um, property. Okay. So where then does the around the downtown core end? What prevents hotel uses gradually extending further into residential streets. Ms. Wayne. Thank you through the mayor. Um, I'll respond to this one. I just, I feel like I've got a couple of points just to add to Mr. Carroll's point from the previous question. Hopefully this will answer your question now. Um, so through the mayor, as Mr. Carroll mentioned, um, our boundaries are defined when it becomes to zoning regulations and development permataries. They follow property lines. And there is a very distinct, um, clear boundary for those parts of the regulations and approved council policy. However, the official

community plan that council has adopted is a lot more broad in its application. Um, so when we look to see whether changing uses supportable, we look to the official Community plan. This site is well within the downtown core broad strokes of the, uh, of the urban structure concept. And so that is how staff have determined that, um, proposal is supportable in terms of its use. Um, as we've mentioned in previous responses to this question, every application is viewed on its own merits. Um, and, uh, the supportability of this one does not necessarily imply that another hotel would be supportable on the same street. And when you responded through the mayor, when you're funded, you used air quotes. So we're, just to give any kind of, um, um, sort of consideration for the neighbourhood. When do those air quotes end? Um, as to, like, is it a block from there? Would that still be okay for a hotel? Like a block further, um, east. Is win.

Thanks for the question through the mayor. I think the intention of this urban structure concept diagram was, was to be flexible. And the OCP is, is by its nature very flexible and its approach. Um, I guess, uh, it's hard to determine where they end because by its nature, it is intended to be, um, a high level document. I think that's the best way I can answer that question. Hopefully that has given you. That's fair answer. The difficulties it won't lead to a lot of certainty for neighbourhoods, I think. So council previously approved the residential development here. What public policy benefit justifies replacing an approved residential use with visitor accommodation. Ms. Wayne, this seems to be something that you're dealing with primarily, unless Mr. Carroll, you'd like to weigh in. I think. Mr. Johnson wants to.

Or Mr. Johnstown. Thank you through the mayor. I just wanted to elaborate on some of Ms. Wayne's comments as well. Um, in terms of the question of, you know, where might be deemed in appropriate location for a hotel in different parts of the city. And I just wanted to add that, um, hotels can take many different forms. Uh, and can operate it various scales. So we have had examples of hotels that are quite small with only six units. Um, there was one that recently came to council and was approved. Um, all the way up to full service hotels. And I think the appropriateness, uh, we're looking at the context and how the design, how the, how the proposal responds to the context in this case, um, while this is a hotel application, the design of the building still maintains that sort of residential type character that fits well in the residential fabric in this transitional zone, uh, on the edge of Downtown, um, whereas a

different design approach might be more appropriate in a more residential area of the city. So I think it's, it's hard to say definitively, you know, which areas may be appropriate for hotels and which wouldn't. I think we would be looking at each application on its own merits. And it's, um, ability to achieve the objectives in not only our policies, but our design guidelines. I hope that's helpful. Thank you. Councillor. Sure. Thanks. Now this development, um, and we heard from the developer that was first considered for, uh, condos, I believe. And then for rental. And they concluded it wasn't financially viable. So is a project viability for the current owner itself of planning justification or should council primarily consider whether hotel use is preferable to residential use of this location. Ms. Wayne. Thanks to the question.

The viability is not a matter of. Council's considerations. We don't have any policies that speak to that. The Community Consultation was based on five stories in the proposal subsequently became six. Why should council advance it before the new scale has actually gone back to the neighbourhood. Mr. Geryl. Uh, through the mayor, thank you for the question. Uh, so that is included in one of the conditions, which is not typical. Normally we would go back to the CALOC prior to proceeding to council. Um, in this case, uh, when the reviews were concluded and the applicant was informed that Second Community meeting would be triggered due to the increased height. At the time, um, it was, uh, we reached out to the CALOC and they do have the opportunity to waive that meeting. And we are still waiting for a reply from that. So we did choose to advance the application and keep that in as a condition, uh, rather than completing that, um, prior to returning

to council. Okay. Thank you. And through the mayor, then let's say this gets approved. It goes to calik. They say, no, do you come back to us or no? It's true. Uh, through the mayor, thank you for that question. Uh, correct. So if council advances the application today, of course you're not approving your, your advancing the application to send out the notifications. There's also the conditions that are design related. And so the intention would be if it precedes as per the recommended motion, the applicant would make the revisions contained in the conditions. There would be the added benefit of the CALUC then seen the closest to final version of the plans. And they would need to complete that meeting. And we would be reporting back to council through as part of the report update report, where we brought forward introductory readings. Thanks. The advisory design panel recommended declining the earlier five - story proposal because of setbacks. We now have a different use and additional

story. Why was the second ADP review not warranted? Mr. Carroll. Uh, through to the Mayor, thanks you for that question. Uh, so the ADP, the previous ADP meeting, as you know, the use was at that time residential. However, I would emphasize that the proposed design was actually very, very similar. Now, it was not reflecting the six story. The additional story, because that's actually one of the latest revisions made by the applicant. Uh, but at the time when we brought in this new rezoning for the proposed hotel use, the design was not significantly different. So we made the choice not to return to the advisory design panel, given there was not substantial differences at that time.

So you're feeling that the, there's been further, sorry, reduced setbacks since that time. Is that the case or no? I know there's been extra height. Yeah. Through to the mayor, uh, thank you for that question. That's an excellent question. Actually, the increase in height was an effort from the applicant to address staff concerns that the rear yard setback was insufficient. So the setbacks have been improved since it was presented to the, um, ADP. And I would note that what was presented to the ADP was also approved by council. And when you're talking about the setbacks, um, staff or say that you need to approximately eight metres. And this proposal for 5. 4 metres. And then I notice of some reference to that in your presentation.

So is the idea that, um, that you would work on getting that larger, somewhere between 5. 4 and eight metres or two eight metres. Mr. Carol. Uh, through the mayor, uh, exactly. Yes. The intention and what we've encouraged with the applicant is to achieve eight metres full across that rear side for the benefit of course advancing urban forest objective store motor objectives and amenity space as well as the adjacency with the abutting property to the north. And therefore, through the mayor that if that tree is in serious risk or risk, uh, then staff would not be proposing going ahead if it gets, um, council approval.

Through to the mayor, all I could say perhaps my parks, uh, colleagues want to elaborate, um, however, at least the arborist report provided and staff have concurred with its findings to date is that the tree is suitable for retention even at the 5. 4 metre setback. However, it has been made clear to me by staff that, um, it would benefit the long - term survival of that tree to have more breathing room and more space. And also for the full growth of the proposed new trees that are also in the great thanks. And I think the last one is about parking and it's different and slightly different way. But how confident is staff that force basis are sufficient for a 30 hotel room or 30 hotel rooms employees deliveries and guest drop offs on a street where parking is already limited. Through the mayor, again, my colleagues in transportation may want to elaborate, but I can weigh in as there was a parking study provided

and the Parkinson study that was provided did not indicate a specific concern with either the traffic flow or the parking and noted that the TDM proposed seem suitable to the proposed variance. So that's about as much as I could say without leaning on my colleagues. And this might be my last question then, and perhaps I missed it, but has staff estimated how many hotel guests and employees will be arriving by car, um, and therefore, depending on surrounding street parking. Secure? Uh, through the mayor, unfortunately, I don't have that information pulled from the Parkinson study. I believe it likely is, um, described in it. So I would have to defer to my team in transportation who did review that parkie. Okay. Mr. Kenney has left us for the moment. And so I'm not sure whether he has someone else. Mr. Doyle, do you have something that you could offer. Just on comment from my colleagues on the EcoPAST? More specifically, uh, that it's intended to, it's

directed at staff. And, uh, tended to reduce the need for parking. But not for hotel guests. Correct. That would just be for staff. And so we don't know how many guests we expect to arrive with the car. Through the mayor, the intensity of parking need generally various by, by type. And so, uh, if this was a 30 unit residential building, the expected vehicle demand would be greater. But for a hotel, there tends to be a mix of people, maybe arriving by taxi and vehicles. So less intensive than if it was, say a comparably size department building. Right. And therefore they feel, Staff feels comfortable that four is good enough. Through the merit in conjunction with the transportation to Biden management measures that the applicant has, has been receptive too. We do believe it's sufficient. For staff. But and then you're saying it's, it's, you don't think many people believe the staff have answered the question.

The question is yes, they are satisfied. Okay. Thank you. Anything else? No. Any other questions. Don't you Coleman? Thank you. And through you your worship. Could you remind us of this isn't an apartment style hotel, which is different than a full service hotel. Could you give us some other examples of apartment style hotels, uh, in the region in the Victoria specifically. Mr. Carroll, are you aware of any of such examples? Uh, through the mayor, um, fortunately I'm not coming to anything that I would consider comparable enough, um, but perhaps somebody else, um, one of my colleagues may offhand know of a similar example. I'm not seeing anybody leaning in. Councillor Kimet would be an appropriate for you to offer anything at this point. So the answer is we don't know. That's fine. Um, the reason I ask is. I may be incorrect, but my understanding is apartment hotels have the opportunity for full time, long - term tendency and short - term tendency. Is that

your understanding. Mr. Girl, has that been raised in this application? Uh, through to the mayor, uh, based on the application materials, that is not the intention. The intention is for a short - term stay hotel meeting our definition in the zoning bylaw of hotel. Okay. So then a follow on question would be this, the ownership of the building stays in its entirety with the applicant. There is no strategy. You can't buy into this. Through to the mayor, thank you for that question. Yes, it has been made clear that this is not, uh, intended to be stratified and is, um, proposed as a strata hotel, which is considered an objectively looked at differently in the zoning bylaws definitions as well. Okay. Thank you. So then, um, any rental activity that accrues to this will generate, uh, destination marketing tax funds. Is that correct? Ms. Thompson, is that correct. Three America. Do you please repeat the question?

So this is, there are some, if I look at other, if I can give an example, if I look at other places like the region hotel, there are some permanent residents in there and there are some rooms that are set for rental stock. Um, my understanding is the rooms that are rented under hotel management generate some destination marketing tax that goes to the DMRT. Is that correct? And would that apply here. Um, uh, through the mayor, I believe you are correct. Um, anything that would be considered a hotel room, uh, and would fall under the MDRT. And then that would flow as all other hotels.

Okay. Thank you. Um, I'm getting, I'm going to bridge into comments. So I'll hold off on that. Thank you. Thank you. Any other questions. Councillor Cardonell speak with you about that matter a little bit later. Are there any other questions. Would someone like to move staff recommendation. Councillor Dellen, Councillor Cardona. Councillor Del, go ahead. Um, just to say that I think this is a thoughtful proposal. I like it. We need more hotel space in the city. Uh, I'm disappointed by the notion that hotels need to be downtown. A lot of people don't want to stay downtown. We have a great hotel in Oak Bay. Oak Bay is a good spot. Rackland's a good spot. South Jubilee by the hospital in my neighbourhood is a good spot. So this is a great spot for a hotel for people who don't want to be downtown. I'm also supportive of the lack of parking. A lot of people get to work without cars. I get to work every

day without a car. Um, actually that's reality in our city is people can't afford cars, especially when they're working cleaning hotel rooms, not a spot where you drive an expensive vehicle up. We take transit and we walk. So everything about this, it's compliant with the OCP. It's online's with our hotel strategy with we need. It fits nicely into the COX 3 corridor of a six - story building. I think it's a very thoughtfully designed building. So, uh, I'm very supportive of this. I think it's been great. Great for the neighbourhood. Thank you, Councillor Caradona is the secondary. Yes. Thank you. And thank you to staff for answering all the questions as detailed as they were.

And for the report, I'm strongly supportive of this proposal. We all know that the city has a huge dearth of hotel capacity right now. And I think adding 30 spaces in this location is the right call. I think there are a lot of folks who, when they visitwn, they want to be on the edge of downtown because it's a little bit less loud. Uh, some guests that we had recently chose to stay in hotels just out of downtown for that reason. Noting also that there are a lot of hotels and little ins and BNBs across Victoria, including in Fairfield and in Rockland, uh, that, um, that have a different style and shape and feel, but, uh, but do welcome in a lot of guests and travellers who are coming from afar. And that's another reason why I think that the relatively low parking is not a huge deal. I think a lot of people are going to come in via clipper and coho and flying

in and coming in other than driving. Um, I think that the design itself is very sharp. It looks really nice. The rooftop amenity looks fantastic. I think it is a hotel that's going to be very well used. And, um, I've got no concerns with it. So I'm happy to move forward. Thank you very much, Councillor. Thank you. This is a bit busier street in many that are near where I live. And I frequently see people, and especially I'm thinking that will be what will happen here. Walking down the middle of the world with a luggage. And this is Fairfield and Cook. And you're going to see that. A lot of people are going to 200 square feet are going to be carrying the luggage from wherever they came. And they're going to be dragging along in the middle of the road to the sidewalks aren't good place to take luggage. So I'm just saying that because I see it all the time in Jamie's Bay.

And it could be quite worrisome. I'm given this intersection. It truly is. But I have an amendment, please. I'd like to mend item number three to add another item. Perhaps best between C and D. Right? And then at M would be plan revisions to ensure the transformer is contained within the billing envelope. Mr. Carroll, did you not answer that question earlier by noting that it is in fact within the building envelope. Uh, through to the mayor, apologies if I was, um, unclear, uh, so know the, the current proposal is for what we call a pad mounted transformer. So a transformer that's external to the building.

Um, we did have extensive discussions encouraging as we always do, uh, in building. Um, transformers and alternative. However, uh, the response from the applicant is we do commonly here is that there's a significant cost to that and that the cost was, uh, not considered acceptable or something they could absorb. And so they did decline to make that revision. So it is still proposed as Pad - mounted. And based on the discussion, we didn't include it as a condition in the recommended motion. Very good. That's my error. All right. Then that seems appropriate. Is your secondary for that. He did. Is there a secondary for that amendment. Councillor Hamitz II. Go ahead. Councillor Gardner on the amendment only. Thank you. I'm concerned about, first of all, noise too and possible tampering, uh, with from others. And so I really believe the transformer should be inside. Thank you. Thank you. Councillor Hammond is the secondary. Nothing to add anybody else of anything to add on the amendment.

Councillor Caradona. Thanks. And to the mayor, I oppose the amendment. What I heard was significant increase in cost and that this issue was already significantly debated between the proponent and staff, uh, it seems like micromanaging a proposal and also is quite technical. And I don't think provides non - experts such as our self a reasonable basis to make that decision. So this is one where, uh, I defer to staff in what was proposed in the proposal. The Q Councillor Kim on the amendment. Thanks for the chair. I sympathize with the mover of this amendment. I for one really can't stand the stand of Transformers, but also I have chosen not to live near them or go to hotels near them. So, um, it's also right by a main, like an arterial like Cook Street Village.

So frankly with all the other ambient noise, I don't see a concern with, um, the project as it's proposed. Thanks. Thank you very much. Anyone else on the amendment. Cancer Dell. I hate to get to do this, but this is, this is completely inappropriate for council to be directing where transformers go within a business. Like I can't even believe this is suggested. Like we need to take it up. We are getting way in the weeds of garbage truck turnarounds and it's been quite aggressive towards staff today on stuff that's in there wheelhouse. We are a board of directors at a high level. So I don't even know if this is a good idea. I know these are things developers talk about what BC Hydro and staff, but this is absolutely not where council should be.

And it's been a significant waste of time today. So I'm going to be opposing this. Thank you. Anybody else, Sonny Amendment. Councillor Gardner on the amendment. Thank you, Staff Reese's issue, which means it's an important issue. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else on the amendment. Let's see, again, I'm also in the amendment. All those in favor of the amendment. Councillor Hammond, Councillor Gardner. In opposition, Councillor Dell, Councillor Kim, Councillor Caradona, Councillor Loth and Councillor Thompson, myself, Ken Councillor Coleman. Noting seven in opposition, that amendment is declined. You could remove that from the page, please staff. And Councillor Gardner, you still have the floor on the main motion as amended. As not amended, I'm sorry. Anything else? Just my final comment, I guess. Yep. I believe the advisory design panel was right. The proposed will development does not sufficiently meet the design guidelines and should be declined. And the proposals, even before, is it even one story higher than the proposal that went before the CALig,

which kind of pours a bit of salt into the wound. And, uh, I'm really quite concerned about some parts of it. And I just think this is an inappropriate place to put a hotel, uh, and I think we'll quite disturb the residential, um, well, the people that live close by, especially with parking issues. And that has already been raised. Um, through letters to us or emails that were attached to the, uh, staff report. So I cannot support this, uh, proposal. Thank you. Thank you very much. Anyone else on this matter. Councillor Hammond. Thanks Mayor. I support redevelopment of the site. And for me, I actually don't have a fundamental objection to six stories of this location. My concern is the proposed use and fit with the neighbourhood. Uh, this site is within the residential fabric and council had already approved a residential project here. We are now being asked to replace that with a 30 room commercial hotel with only four parking spaces in an

area where residents have raised real concerns about parking traffic noise and the change from permanent housing to transient accommodation. I am also concerned that the project grew from five to six stories after the original Community Consultation, again, not my issue, but, um, which is why staff themselves are requiring additional CALA consultation before Bylaw readings. I think that consultation should come before council is asked to advance the proposal not after. Also, I understand the economics of this project have changed substantially since the original approval. Construction costs have risen and the applicant has concluded that the previously approved residential project is no longer viable. But council's responsibility is not to guarantee that every property can produce the return anticipated by its owner. We don't ask for extra profits coming to us after someone makes more money from the proposed plans they have. Our responsibility is to determine what land use and development form are appropriate for the neighbourhood and for the city as a whole. I also

think we need to be careful about the signal we send to the land market. If the council routinely responds to market economics by granting additional density or a more lucrative use purchases will begin pricing land on the assumption that council will later increase this development potential. Development economics matter, but they cannot become the reason planning policy moves every time a particular project is not pencil out. For me, this is not a vote against redevelopment is vote against this particular commercial use in this location in a residential area for those reasons I'll be voting no. Thank you very much. Anybody else? Okay. Uh, you have the motion before you, Councillor Coleman, go ahead. Thank you. Um, this is unusual. We do have lots of examples of hospitality room opportunities in neighbourhoods. They tend to articulate themselves as Bed and Breakfast, ends, or bed and breakfasts. And now in the last decade, STRs. This is a change that may become a trend. I don't know, or it

may be just a one - off response to hard economic times. Uh, but it's, it is unusual in a number of ways. And with bed breakfasts and bed and breakfasts ends, and I differentiate between the two because it talks about the volume of rooms that are involved and has a parking impact. It has, we've learned over the years in that post. Commonwealth Games period where we asked people to embrace alternative lodging because we knew a lot of people were coming and people found they liked it. And local people then started going, well, we could develop a bed and breakfast. Industry. It took us a decade to put that genie back in the bottle and try and manage it properly. This may be the precursor of a future trend. It will be harder to put back in the bottle, I suspect. And it will have a profound impact. If I'm correct. It will have a profound impact on traffic patterns within neighbourhoods that take on this

new iteration. Um, I don't think this has been fully. Played through. I do think it does need more consultation with, uh, the CALOC process. And the change from five to six stories and the density that comes with that are the more units will have a potential traffic impact within the flow of the neighbourhood. So I recognise this is an unusual, interesting application, but I find I'm against it. Thank you. Anyone else. Not seeing anyone else. As I mentioned earlier, it is on the table appropriately move in seconded. All those in favor. Councillor Dell, Councillor Kim, consecute on it, Councillor Lown, myself. Councillor Thompson. In opposition, Councillor's Coleman, Hammond and Gardner. Noting three and opposition, that is advanced to the next stage. Thank you very much, staff, for your eloquent answers. And for answering every single question we asked. I'm going to suggest that we take a short break right now as we have been sitting for quite a long time. It is almost 10 to

3. So let us resume at 3 o'clock and return to the balance of our business at committee. Everyone, if we could return to our seats, we do have a significant amount of work yet to do today, both at committee and council. And so if we could please take our seats and resume, that would be excellent. We are up to our committee agenda at item H. These are staff reports. There are two. The first one, H1, the Vancouver Island injured Community Business licensing bylaw was in fact placed on the consent agenda. And so that will come back to us at a future daytime council meeting for final consideration, which does take us then on to item H2. This is the advisory panel bylaws. And this was placed on the consent agenda and pulled by Councillor Gardner. I'm going to ask Councillor Gardner whether she needs a presentation or whether she just simply has questions.

I just have a quick question. All right, why don't we just go right to questions? And if it turns out that we need a presentation at some point, we can return to that at the beginning. Please go ahead. Okay, thank you very much for the information you provided. It was very useful. So I quite liked reading the report. I'm sure because I found it quite valuable, even though it was short, the Heritage Advisory and Advisory panel bylaws are being altered, as you've mentioned. And during the July 30th Committee of the Whole meeting, the approved motion arise rising, emotionalizing, concerned the heritage committee dedicated to policies for the historic commercial district Oldtown. And I'd like to alter the recommendation to include the intent of that motion if it's possible. It is not. It's not possible. No, it is not. Okay, does Staff of any idea as to when that motion will be honoured, and because it almost fits into this spot. Do either of our stuff

here, or is this a Mr. Johnston? I'm not sure who would be best placed to answer this. Please go ahead and dispose of you introduced yourself as well. Thank you, Mayor Alto. My name is Lauren Close. I'm the manager of Community Planning. As we bring forward the scopes to council to consider updating the Downtown Corps area plan and renewing the Heritage Program, that's the time at which council would have an opportunity to review what engagement would look like, including with the Heritage Community per that motion. Thank you. And what time, man, we'd be looking for that particular motion rising. We'd be looking to bring those scopes of work forward later this year. Thank you. Is that it? Okay. Any other questions. Not seeing any other questions with someone like to move the Staff recommendation. Thanks, Councillor Coleman, Councillor Garrett - Ona III, Councillor Coleman, any thoughts. Not generally, no. On this matter, no. Councillor Caradona, any thoughts on this matter? Nope, very good. Anyone else

wished to comment on this matter. Not seeing anyone else. Then it has been duly moved and seconded. All those in favor. Is anyone opposed. That is unanimous. Thank you very much for that. That would take us on to items of new business. There was only one, and thank you very much, Ta forging that forward. There was only one item of new business that was the council member motion with regard to finding approaches for the City of Victoria to further respond to America's trade war. That was placed on the consent agenda. And so we'll return to us again for a final consideration. At a daytime council meeting presently. That does take us then to item J, which is in fact a motion to adjourn committee. Thank you very much, Councillor Coleman, always reliable, seconded by Councillor Kim. Any particular comment on that, seeing none all those in favor. Anyone opposed. That concludes committee. I suggest this if we just took a break that we just stay

in our places until staff have a chance to move us into our daytime council, we'll proceed immediately when that is ready.